A Necessary Arrangement
by Legio IX Hispana
Summary: A young queen and a brash admiral were promised to one another in a necessary arrangement that ensures the alliance of their countries. With both of them unwilling and unprepared, they decided nonetheless to go through the unfair arranged marriage by living separate lives. It was not easy, per se, given that they will have to endure one another while living under the same roof.
1. I - Admiral and Crowned Princess

**I.**

**The Admiral and the Crowned Princess**

* * *

It's not that the King did not trust his daughter. It was just… Well, his eldest child has a… _problematic _predicament.

It was rather unsettling and mystifying how Elsa had been born with powers that had only existed in myth: the ability to manifest, manipulate, and reign over the power of ice and snow.

The King suspected that this was because of a malpractice some centuries ago in their Royal Bloodline.

He _has _read of a foolish ancestor of his who has been involved with "black magic", exhorting any means, no matter how "demonic" or life threatening, to conquer neighbouring countries. The idiosyncratic cretin failed, of course, and along his wake, followed several years of hardships in trade and diplomacy that his descendants had to repair tediously for him.

In a span of two centuries, there has only been three accounts of the possession of this kind of "anomaly" in the family: a prince who perished after unsuccessfully trying to remove the magic from his body "through every possible means"; a princess who was ultimately granted a merciful death as an infant by her own parents after her powers were discovered; and now, Elsa.

And the King and his Queen were determined to keep both their daughter and the power she innately possesses, regardless of how it had obviously terrified the staff at first. Granted, they wish to keep this a secured secret as long as they can manage.

Elsa's powers were mostly harmless, especially after a critical disaster that had occurred when she and her younger sister, Anna, were playing as children. Everyone knew it was an accident, as Elsa- with her benevolent and gentle heart- would _never _dream to strike her powers at her sister. The sliver of magic, thankfully, did not cause the young princess' death. With Anna saved through the help of the aboriginal Trolls living in the forests of the kingdom, the King saw to it that Elsa was to learn to harness her powers with the help of the Trolls at any chance they get.

More often than they dared to admit, the King, the Queen, and even Anna, felt that Elsa grew up plagued with the heavy burden of learning to run a country and control her powers at the same time. The King wasn't a cruel man, everyone knows that, but he wasn't entirely lax in preparing his daughter for her future duties.

"I'll marry one day, won't I, Father? Surely, my husband would be the king. Forgive me, but why do I have to learn so much if it will all fall to my husband one day?" was the question inferred by a thirteen year old Elsa, close to tears, as she had been tasked to finish an entire volume that had centred on advanced matters of diplomacy within a week.

She did not mean for it to sound like a complain, but the heavy fatigue, the suffocating pressure, was finally getting to her. She was greatly upset that she had been playing less with Anna. She hadn't read a single book about anything else other than her assigned texts. She hadn't left the castle for so long that she couldn't remember the last time she ever did. She even began to miss the Trolls, especially dear old Pabbie.

The King remembered how uncharacteristically cold it was in the room that day despite the summer heat rolling beyond the window. He saw how panicked, how close to disintegrating his daughter was as she stood before him, _begging _him to spare her from more torture.

"Elsa," the King sighed, kneeling in front of his daughter, and securing the gloves in her hands; the gloves that were the only things keeping her magic in check, "Child, you still _are _the one carrying the Royal Bloodline of Arendelle in your veins. The man you'll marry, my dear, is no more than a stranger that will come to help you, but he will _not_ take away your duty from you"

"Still," Elsa added mournfully, "He'll help me… I won't have to do everything on my own… What if I… What if I _fail _the people of Arendelle? W-What if I—?"

"Elsa, look at me," the King quickly interjected, noticing the light fall of snow in the room and the sudden drop of temperature, "Look at me, please, dear? Listen to me. It makes you stronger, you see, when you _do_ things on your own, when you accomplish something on your own. Yes, my love, being alone is difficult. _Very _difficult. But it makes you stronger. Remember this, my dear girl: the success you'll achieved with someone else will only be equivalent to half of the glory you'll gain when you have done something all by yourself. For that success is yours, and yours alone. Earn it. Own it. You owe it to yourself, at least, for some recognition for a job well done."

As Elsa flung herself into his embrace, crying to him, thanking him, the King thought there and then that his daughter _indeed _needed someone to be there for her, someone who'll help her, care for her, _protect_ her.

He knew that Elsa would not like it. Most likely, she will not. But he trusts in his allies that one of their sons will just be the right match for his daughter.

Besides, he needed to warn them about Elsa's… _condition_. The sooner they know, the faster and easier it would be for Elsa to have a willing suitor. Or at least, a king or queen willing to marry off their son to someone unique (_For that is what Elsa is_, the King thought proudly) as Arendelle's heir.

Despite his heartfelt speech to his daughter mere hours ago, he himself agreed to one thought: He doesn't want his daughter to go through all this alone.

That night, after visiting the girls and tucking them to sleep, the King and Queen began to run through the names of the princes living in the nearby kingdoms.

The kingdom of the Southern Isles seemed to have the most promising country so far, given the number of sons they have. Not a bad family either, they noted.

* * *

His brother was crowned "King of the Southern Isles" that day, and where was he?

Locked in a secluded cupboard in the kitchens.

The place was empty, of course, seeing as the servants had come to witness the coronation of the new king.

His two maniacal, psychopathic twin brothers couldn't have picked a better time to strike.

Frej and Flemming had asked him to go to the kitchens to fetch them a "celebratory wine", as they were "planning" to have a little private toast with their crowned prince brother, Osvald, and the rest of their brothers and half-brothers before the ceremony starts. Being the idiot that he was, a timid fifteen year old Hans sped to the kitchens, so eager to be part of his circle of brothers even for just a little while.

Dressed in his best as he was, Hans spent the next four five hours in the kitchen cupboard, as Frej and Flemming seemed to have forgotten themselves that they had locked their little half-brother somewhere in the castle. Hans only got out of his enclosure when one of the cleaners passing through heard him sniffling.

Of course, his little "disappearance" made him the least favourite brother. Again.

Hans arrived at the party later than he had intended. Naturally, he had to change his clothes and wipe the dust and smudges on his skin. He had to appear fresh, not stricken with angry eyes red with tears.

The newly crowned Osvavld moved about in the hall, accepting congratulatory remarks here and there. He found little Hans by the door, looking small and diminutive, as if he wished nothing more than to disappear through the wall behind him. Being the youngest in the family, Hans was easily distinguished by his eldest brother, and Osvald was not at all pleased with his absence. Sure, Hans was a moody and broody young man; it was understandable at his age. But to miss something so important…

"Where have you been?" Oswald asked him, trying to quell his annoyance, his brimming irritation, at how the young prince has been behaving.

"… Around," Hans answered curtly, eyes casted on the ground. Osvald didn't have to know. He didn't want to make everything worse.

Osvald opened his mouth to speak, to admonish the boy, but he didn't want to embarrass the two of them in a public gathering such as this. he couldn't trust himself with the words that might spill from his lips. He merely left.

Hans could not even look at him. No one could deny that among all thirteen of them in the family, Osvald was the one who looked very much like the late King of the Southern Isles. From the pure emerald gleam in his eyes to the richest dark brown locks. His beard was even starting to grow in a similar way as the King's did. For all the graces and composure, Osvald inherited their father's gentle heart, but stern governance. It was as if their father never died at all, they would say.

And Hans loved their father. Granted, the late King had a total of five wives; three of them divorced, and the other two deceased.

But as many as his sons were, the King would allot at least some time with each of them before he closes his eyes and retire for the night. Hans, as the youngest, would always be the last to see him every night, and by then, the King would be absolutely tired already. But still, the King would stay up. He would listen to Hans. He would praise his youngest for his eyes and his auburn hair; the most beautiful and prominent features of his beloved late wife, the Lady Adeline. The Lady Adeline, who did not live long enough to see her son grow into a young prince, for she had succumbed to death mere minutes after her only child to the King was born.

"You have her eyes, my son. Her hair. Her stubbornness, even," the King told him again one night, several months ago, as Hans sat beside him, holding his hand as he lay there, wheezing in slight pain at the illness he had been enduring for weeks now, "Her charm as well, no doubt. I heard you got in trouble with a baker's daughter sometime this week…"

Hans lowered his head, mollified. "I assume it was Valentin who told you about this…"

The King merely chuckled, giving his son's hand a gentle tap. "Was she beautiful, dear boy?"

Hans' complexion was slowly matching the shade of his hair. "Father…"

"My young son, clearly you've managed to inherit my love for women. It is never good."

"Father, not to belittle you or anything, but you're being a hypocrite."

The King laughed. "I know, I know. Which is why I'm telling you this now. I loved all your mothers. Yours, especially. You're grinning. Ah, you think I am joking? Yes, I loved all of them, and I loved your mother the most. Why? For she managed to give me what my other wives did not: Love."

"I don't understand, father."

"You don't have to, at this age. You're young, and so was I. It was around your age when I was promised to Princess Gretha, Osvald's mother. It excited me, oh yes. To tell you a little secret, Osvald was conceived before the marriage—"

"Father."

"Oh, don't be so modest, Hans. Valentin told me what kind of _trouble _you've gotten yourself into with that girl."

"… I'm going to kill him."

The King laughed again. "Joking aside, Hans, there was excitement, yes. So it was with my other wives. But your mother… Excitement did not come first. I was struck, you see, with how beautiful her soul was. She loved the people, despite of being raised in a secluded manor as the Duke's daughter. She had a fiery determination, too, that woman. Always insisted on doing my papers for me when she gets exasperated with how dull I write them. Charming to boot, as well. She might have been a clever trickster with her way of words. Maybe she was. Winning her hand was a lover's labour. She was absolutely _evasive_. At one point or another, I was sure she hated me. Well, it all worked out in the end. She's a hard lady, but she's a gentle soul once you get pass her insecurities. I _loved _her so much, my dear boy. I could never find another woman like her."

Hans nodded. "Is that why you never married again?"

The King's eyes shone as he looked at Hans. "I think you've had enough brothers to deal with," he said amiably, and Hans saw how his eyes got misty and suddenly vulnerable, "It's true. You're right. I loved her with all my heart. I can never love someone as much I had loved her. And I love her still, even now. She's alive, my son, whenever I look at you. My dear boy, promise me one thing."

"Anything, father," Has readily answered, feeling his heart clench painfully at his father's confession.

"Keep yourself happy. You'll never be happy here, with your brothers. Don't argue. I told you, Valentin has been telling me _things_. My son, my prayer for you is that you find someone who _will _complete you, as your mother had done to me. You deserved so much more than what your own family has to offer you, and for that, we are sorry. Don't ever think that you're alone. No one is alone, Hans. I just want you to be happy, to _finally _be happy…"

The King could not continue after that, as he was attacked by a series of coughing fits.

Three days later, his sons gathered around his bed some time around midnight. The King died, alone, in his sleep. He did not find the strength to call for his servants and the doctors, for them to call his sons for his final farewell.

Young Hans was the last to leave the King's corpse. When it was evident that he wasn't leaving anytime soon, they have to haul the anguished prince away from the room to prepare the King's body for his last rights.

* * *

She was eighteen. Anna had just turned fifteen.

They received the news around midnight. Gerda had knocked cautiously on their doors. Elsa did not awake soon enough, as she was greatly fatigued from reading her father's anecdotes.

If she was being honest to herself, she had crammed the task. Several hours earlier, she and Anna had a good deal of laughs from reading their mother's private diary. Their parents were away on a trip, and they have complete unrestricted access to their parents' bedroom. The guilt of such mischief and misconduct had pushed Elsa into returning to her work while Anna simply slipped off to bed.

When Elsa finally decided to grant the poor waiting woman access to her room, she was horrified to see both Gerda's and Anna's eyes burning with tears. Behind them, Kai and other court officials were waiting. Elsa began to wish that she should have at least wore something more presentable.

"A message was sent, your majesty," Gerda said stiffly, keeping her tears at bay. She broke, however, as she said the last word, and she turned away from a confused Elsa.

Kai stepped in her stead. He looked tired, solemn. It was the most serious look Elsa had seen the jolly man pull off in years. He looked at her steadily for a moment. Elsa was too confused, too frightened, to dare to ask what was happening, so she waited.

And then Kai, suddenly dropped to one knee, and bowed his head.

Gerda, who was sobbing quietly, dropped to her knees as well, and so did the other court officials at Elsa's door. Anna, disheveled and rattled as she was, looked at Elsa's eyes for a long time, before she had done the same, dropping beside Gerda.

"Long live the Queen," Kai suddenly spoke up.

The proclamation was repeated by every other person in the room in unison. Over and over, and over again.

_Long live the Queen. Long live the Queen. Long live the Queen._

Elsa's head spun. Blood drained from her face. The room's temperature helplessly dropped into a freezing temperature. Ice lazily and slowly spread from below her feet.

They did not say the words, but the message was clear. Absolutely clear with resolute clarity and formidable truth.

Her parents are dead.

The throne was entirely hers.

And she did not want it.

* * *

He was the youngest admiral in the history of the Southern Isles at the age of twenty three.

More or less, Hans handled the fleet, making sure the cargo their ships were carrying was safely shipped to another country. The fleet's massive arsenal was of no use at the moment; it was a time of peace. But despite the dullness of his career, Hans always managed to find reasons to be out in the sea, sailing from port to port, living the life of a sailor than a bachelor.

He wouldn't be one anymore in a few months anyway.

He learned—recently, at that — that he was already promised to a princess of Arendelle.

And not just any princess. He was to wed a crowned princess, soon to be queen.

As it turns out, Osvald had been holding on to some documents sent to their father years ago. As their father never managed to answer it, it fell to Osvald's hands for him to solve. It was a letter sent by the King of Arendelle, requesting for one of the princes to be a suitor for their daughter. In the letter, Osvald saw that the princess had some sort of… _problem_.

Well. It was nothing new. Quite recently, one of this brothers, Adgar, had been repeatedly reported to have a dalliance with a "sorceress" in the woods. Well, she _did _somehow manage to erupt a bout of flames in her wake as she fled when Osvald's soldiers came to apprehend her.

Hans was the only one closest to the princess' age (she being twenty-one, and he being twenty-three). And it was as if Hans was doing anything useful other than waste the funds of the kingdom on his exploits in other lands. More than once, Hans stirred trouble, mostly from merchants declaring that the prince had "soiled their daughters". Osvald had to admit: Hans _did _have his way using his charm, the little devil that he was. It was getting ridiculous. Marriage, he realized, would finally be a good way to tie him down.

"… I'm sorry? Perhaps I heard you wrong," Hans blurted out, looking completely nonplussed as he stood in his brother's office.

"You did not," Osvald said as he stood before the window, hands behind his back, "I already sent the reply to Arendelle three days ago."

Hans glowered. "You could have at least informed me," he said in a low, but surprisingly calm voice. If there was one thing that stuck to him in his years of misery in the palace he had called home, it was that no one should ever see him break, see him _weak_. If he had to hide behind a mask, a facade, so be it.

"You would have said no."

"You know I would've. Why _me_?"

"Hans, the princess of Arendelle is… _unique_. Solidifying our alliance with her is our upmost priority. I chose you, for you two are nearly of the same age. And with the fleet at your command, we can offer Arendelle military service, and they could offer us more trading opportunities. It's a good opportunity for both our countries."

"I refuse to take part in this," Hans said, unyielding as ever as he stood, proud and imposing.

"You must remember that you are first and foremost a Westergaard," Osvald began, pacing steadily in the room, "The royal lineage in the Eastern Tribunes is of Westergaard. The Duke of Cantercroft is a Westergaard. Five of our brothers, who are all married to duchesses and princesses, are Westergaards. The _King _of the Southern Isles _is _a Westergaard, and _you _are the next piece in the game."

"That is not exactly a compelling argument—"

"You _will _accept this marriage, and that is final!" Osvald roared, "For _once _in your life, be of use to this family!"

Hans said nothing. He can't look at Osvald. He know he'll only see his father— especially now, given how Osvald had matured, more and more resembling the King as every year goes by— and he knows his resolve will only crumble. He had to remind himself that it was Osvald who was saying these stabbing words to him, not his father. His father would never _ever _say things like these to him…

Osvald evened his breathing, cleared his throat, and promptly sat down.

"Now, Hans, if you please. Sit. Before you go to Arendelle, there is something you need to know about your future bride…"


	2. II - Formalities

to **Frozenmyheart: **Yes, they were from _The Young Victoria_. I get inspirations there for this fic. Thanks for calling dibs on first commenter :)

* * *

**II. **

**Formalities**

* * *

"Is it just me or you look… a bit thinner this week…"

"I'm fine, Anna. Don't trouble your pretty head about it."

"… No, you're not."

Elsa sighed, slumping down on her seat. If she was to make things easier, she have to admit it to herself. "Yes. I'm not."

How could she be? Her affianced prince was due to arrive today, and less than a month from now, she was already told that they are to begin their rehearsals for her coronation.

It has been a complete shock, of course — three years ago, to be exact— when she discovered that her father had planned for her marriage to some complete stranger from across the seas. She found out through her father's will that she will not only inherit the kingdom, but she will also be wed to the said stranger no sooner than after she was queen to "ensure the stability of her reign". Her father had sent a request letter many years ago, and Elsa had hoped for the best that the kingdom they've sent it to did not find her favourable (_Why should they? I__'__m sure it__'__ll be a freak show when they discover that I have powers__…_). She ever dismayed and aghast that a reply had been sent nearly a week ago, confirming the arrival of her fiancee for formalities.

She loved her father, Heaven knows she and Anna did with all their heart. But this only puts her love for him, even in his death, to the test.

Did he not trust her? She thought he wanted her to be strong on her own? Why this? Why not inform her sooner about this? Why only _her_? There wasn't anything arranged for Anna— not that she wanted her own sister to suffer such tribulations— in his will other than a great share of land and wealth. If he had been planning this, why not introduce her to her fiancee sooner? What was he _thinking_—?

"Elsa, you're making it snow."

Elsa sighed heavily, tiredly. She leaned her head back, watching as the scattered flakes of her magic dissipate in the air as she finally regained control of her senses. "I'm sorry, it's just that—"

"Hey, no worries," Anna immediately added up, grinning brightly, hoping to channel positivity in the air to uplift her troubled sister. She's never seen Elsa so worked up in a while, not since the morning after their parents… well. "I love a little cold breeze in spring… Uh, actually, no, not really. It's not that I don't like it— I mean, I _do _like it in a way?— but you know I've been a little sick this weekend—"

A smile tugged on Elsa's lips as she looked at Anna, eyes twinkling in mischief. "Yes, I wonder why that happened…"

Anna was glad to see the shift in the mood, but their new topic still embarrassed her. "Oh, come on! Kristoff said he was sorry! It wasn't his fault anyway, I _swear_. I mean, _I _volunteered to go ice cutting with him, okay—"

"And you were a spectacular ice harvester, I've heard," Elsa mused, slightly grinning now as she leaned against her seat, "You have everyone rushing over when you fell in the water—"

"Okay, _maybe_ I didn't immediately notice that I was cutting the ice the wrong way, and I _might _have caused the whole thing I was standing on to completely sink."

The crowned princess's office rang with laughter for quite a while after that.

"Ah, okay," Anna began, evening her breaths, but even that wasn't enough to wipe away the grin sticking to her face, "Can I see him later? After the Southern Isles thing, at least?"

"I don't see why not," Elsa replied, still smiling up at her.

"Well, I don't see why I should keep you further," Anna said, hoping down from where she had been sitting on Elsa's desk and making her way out of the room. "See you later?"

"Yes, I'll see you soon."

The moment Anna left, the silence reminded Elsa of all she had forgotten briefly.

Her thoughts quickly turned to the arrival of the Prince. She'd never seen him before, but she is aware that he was the youngest out of thirteen sons (_Heavens, why so many?_, she thought) of the Southern Isles. He was quite young, in her opinion, to have complete control over an entire fleet. He was to arrive with a chaperone, and Elsa expects it to be the current king, his brother, Osvald.

She was only pushing this through for her father's sake. Even though she was of age, she did not feel that she was up to the idea of being thrown into a married life. She has thought about it, yes, but she did not want it just yet. And now…

_Well, at least Anna is happy_, she ruminates.

For the last three years, she and Anna had arranged frequent visits to the Trolls. Their visits were at peak during the first months after their parents' death. Grand Pabbie did more than console the two princesses; he was a surrogate father in his own special way. It was there where they have met Kristoff, an orphaned boy graciously raised by the Trolls. Loneliness and the same sense of being orphans might have brought Anna and Kristoff together. Even though they would never admit it, Elsa knew that they weren't simply "friends" anymore; she could see it in the way Anna looks at him. She could hear it in the way Anna talks about him.

And Elsa simply wants her to be happy. Sure, if there ever came a day when Kristoff will propose to her sister, they might be going against the protocol of a princess being promised to a nobleman. But by Heaven, Elsa is a queen (_Or queen-to-be_, she mentally corrects herself), and she will see to it that she makes use of her authority for the sake of her sister.

_At least she__'__s happy_.

Elsa just hopes for the best that Prince Hans is a decent gentleman.

* * *

"By Father's beard, Hans. I'm pretty sure you weren't wearing that when we left."

"Good morning to you, too, Valentin."

Hans stood by the bow of his ship, watching Arendelle loom in the distance; the kingdom shone in the morning light.

His older brother, Valentin, staggered next to him, rubbing the sleep away from his eyes. They left the Southern Isles before dawn, and clearly, Valentin was not happy with his broken sleep cycle. And _clearly_, Osvald had instructed both of them to wear their best in meeting Arendelle's princesses. _Clearly_, some time in their journey, Hans decided to rebel by changing into something… _ridiculous_, Valentin noted.

Valentin couldn't help but laugh, though. "You look like you're going to a funeral! Who died?"

"My _life_, Valentin," Hans muttered, angrily tugging on the lapels of his coat.

Valentin shook his head, still smiling. "Osvald will have your neck for it."

"Osvald isn't here."

"By Heaven, man, is this how you usually approach the ladies?"

"The _Crowned _Princess of Arendelle is not a common wench to be found in the streets or in a tavern, Valentin," Hans replied, "She's a spoiled, miserable brat holed up in a castle. A change of demeanour is in order here."

He didn't state, however, the "unfortunate condition" the princess was struggling with. Valentin needn't know. It was a confidential information Osvald had strictly instructed him not to simply blurt out with anyone, not even to the only brother who wasn't treating him like vermin. As much as he hated Princess Elsa as early as now, he at least had the decency to protect her personal information. He was not the completely animal his brothers made him out to be.

"You don't know that, now, Hans, but I'm sure she's not running a funeral home either," Valentin chuckled, "Surely you'd like to change your mind about your apparel?"

"As I am absolutely forbidden to be a complete arse in her majesty's presence, I prefer leaving implications on how I feel about this stupid agreement. My apparel, I'm sure, will be a message enough."

"That, or she might just think that you have a very poor fashion sense."

Hans sighed in exasperation. "I swear, you were born to torment me."

Valentin smiled. "I haven't seen you in six years, brother— well, I'm sorry, but I love my wife very much— but I swear I still see the boy you once were every now and then. You've changed, surely. Don't we all? But you're still that boy who always sat laughing in Father's lap whenever it's just the three of us alone in the throne room. Be happy for him, at least? Do this for him, for the Southern Isles. Not for Osvald."

Hans was quiet for a moment. And then he said, "You're trying to guilt-trip me, aren't you?"

Valentin, still smiling, held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Just living up to the family's expectations as a professional arsehole. Now, about your choice of clothes…"

"No. Now shut up."

* * *

Elsa was already waiting in the throne room when Kai had informed her that the ship from Southern Isles had docked. She just stood there, strangely still, in, in front of the throne. She fidgeted with her gloves, and she feared that she might tear them any second now, but she simply can't help it.

Gerda had to remind her to calm down when the windows were beginning to get foggy. But how in the world is she supposed to calm down? Other than Anna, Kristoff, the staff, and the Trolls, Elsa pretty much haven't met any other people, let alone noblemen. Kai had been gracious enough to help in her through regency while she was not yet crowned as the queen, but their diplomacies where always handled through letters, not actual meetings or personal appearances.

Anna arrived a little later, practically bouncing in nervous energy. They tried to talk, but both of them were helplessly anxious beyond their wits. Anna had always been the social one, Elsa admitted, but she was not the one who was supposed to talk to the Westergaard brothers.

What if she said the wrong thing? What if she made herself look like a complete idiot?

_What if her powers show and she won__'__t be able to control it_?

They arrived at the castle a little too soon than Elsa can take it, and the room was submerged in a temperature that was too abnormal for a regular spring day. Any moment now, Kai will announce their presence and usher them into the throne room…

"Elsa…" Anna said quietly, seeing how incredibly rigid her sister had become, as if she was completely frozen, "Elsa, I'm here."

The heat settled in slowly. The cool air was still lingering about, but it was not too obvious as before. Anna heard Elsa sigh, followed by a voice barely above a whisper, "I know."

Silence. The temperature was beginning to return to normal now.

"Hey, Elsa, maybe now's a great time to build a snowman," Anna said out of the blue. To her relief, Elsa chuckled.

"Quite."

"And perhaps we could bring him to life and set him on the Westergaards."

Elsa laughed. "That's a sight to see. What will we name him, though?"

"Hm, remember Olaf?"

"Oh my gosh, you still remember him?"

"Yeah, well, it's hard to forget when Mother and Father both scolded us for stealing that carrot from the kitchen."

"But it was just one carrot!"

"I know, right!"

It was incredulous, Elsa thought, that they were laughing then and there while mere moments before, she was ready to faint. It was incredible, even, that Anna has a natural gift in bringing in laughter into her life despite her awkwardness and notorious clumsiness. Even then, when they were young, Elsa would think that if her powers were to control ice, Anna's was spreading happiness. As a child, Elsa would happily trade her powers for that. Even now. Even today. _Especially _today.

"His Royal Highness, Prince Valentin of the Eastern Tribunes, and His Excellency, Prince Hans of the Southern Isles!" Kai announced from where he stood by the door.

"Why do they always insist with very long titles and honorific?" Anna muttered, "Honestly, it sounds like they're selling livestock in the market."

Elsa had to bite her bottom lip to keep herself in check; she shouldn't have the time to laugh, not when the doors just swung open.

But she mentally swore that she will get Anna for that later.

The two princes barely had a semblance to one another. Heaven forbid, but it was if they weren't brothers at all. The other one had a mesmerising chestnut coloured hair, while the other, the taller one, had shockingly auburn colour. Grey eyes in one, and green eyes in the other. One looks like complete gentleman while the other… Well, Elsa did not mean him any offence, but he looked as though someone _died_…

The two princes bowed. Elsa and Anna reciprocated them; Anna doing the protocolled curtsy, and Elsa merely inclining her head. It was no question who has the highest authority in the room.

As Elsa was steeling her nerves for her very first live conversation with another royal, she felt her worries ease up a little when the prince with the chestnut hair stepped forward, a very serene and gentle smile on his face, as he bowed his head once more.

"Your Highness," he said softly as he straightened up, "I'm Valentin, my lady. And this is my brother, Hans."

As his name was addressed, Hans gave a curt nod as an acknowledgment.

Elsa felt her insides run empty as she looked at the young man (_Not exactly young, isn__'__t it, when he__'__s older than me?_) donned in black.

_ This was supposed to be her fiancee? _

Everything from his coat, vest, cravat, and blouse was completely _black_. Well, save for the identical crimson sash he and his brother wore across their chests, announcing their Order and nobility as princes. His apparel made his auburn hair stand out all the more, made his glinting green eyes boring into hers more pronounced.

He was not smiling.

It was beginning to unnerve Elsa.

Has she done something wrong? But they just got here. They barely even talked!

So she turned to his amiable brother instead. "I hope the trip was pleasant?" she asked with a small smile, just to ease her anxiety.

Valentin grinned, and he opened his mouth to reply, but that was when Hans suddenly spoke up, "Both of us are not inclined to seasickness. Her Highness needn't worry."

The way his voice sounded, Elsa thought, did not match the way his expression was set. He sounded strangely calm for a man with a frown fit for a soldier in a battlefield.

There was a suffocating pause, and then Valentin spoke up.

"You majesty, I apologise for my brother, Osvald, as he had pressing matters to attend to, and he could not join us today. I am here in his stead."

Elsa almost did not hear him.

Hans had been looking at her just then, answering her direct gaze with his. His eyes flick from the gloves she wore in her interlaced hands to her eyes. She felt herself grow uncomfortably cold inside; a cold that had nothing to do with her powers.

_Did he know?_

It was impossible. And Elsa took comfort in that. Perhaps, maybe her odd fiancee was only having issues with clothing. He was probably having a crisis because of his _obviously poor _fashion sense…

Anna had to fake a cough— Elsa thought it was _too _theatrical— to get her attention.

"Of course, of course. Please, it's all right," she said, smiling to regain her confidence, "I understand. _Ahem_. Gentlemen, you should be hungry. Please, join us for lunch."

"We'd be honoured to, Your Majesty," Valentin said, grinning widely as he bowed again, "To be honest, I was just thinking when the food will be served."

"Right now, if you're ready," Elsa responded, smiling.

"Well, if the gracious princesses of Arendelle are willing to wait, we'd like to settle in our rooms for a little repose," Valentin continued, "Perhaps fifteen minutes, Your Majesty?"

Elsa nodded. "Of course."

"Thank you, indeed, my lady, you've been so kind," Valentin said while bowing again, unknowingly making Elsa's cheeks flush. "Well, Hans, what do you say—?"

"In fifteen minutes, Your Majesty," Hans said curtly in the same calm manner, bowing his head before promptly exiting the room.

_More like _marching_ out of the room_, Elsa thought, confused and a little alarmed.

Valentin, as Elsa had guessed by now, quickly diffused the situation charmingly. He was smiling as he said, "I better follow him before he trips over himself now, shall I?"

* * *

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"Well, you know _what _well."

Elsa sighed as she paced agitatedly around Anna's room, leaving flurries of snow here and there. "Well what do you want me to say, Anna?"

Anna sat on her bed, crossing her arms. "Don't be mad at me— well, I _know _you can _never _be mad at me, like _ever_— but I don't like Hans," she said with a frown. "I like Valentin more."

"He's married."

"… Okay. Nevermind what I just said—"

"I don't like him."

"Whoa, whoa, there's no need to go overboard in hating Valentin now just because he's marr—"

"Hans! I don't like Hans!"

The gentle fall of snow around them halted, suspending the flakes in midair.

"…You could say no…" Anna said quietly, her breath coming out in fogs.

"I can't," Elsa said, and Anna winced slightly when she heard her voice crack, "It's already _arranged_. Father made sure of that long time ago… It's in _his _will, I can't just… I can't just say _no. _If I'm going to be queen, part of the arrangement stated that I also needed a husband...

"What are you going to do now?" Anna asked hesitantly.

Elsa looked at her, and when Anna saw her eyes, she could only imagine the inner turmoil Elsa must be suffering silently on her own, the war inside her head, the suffocation in her heart…

"I don't know."

* * *

"You're lucky Osvald isn't here."

"I couldn't care less if he was."

"As much as I want to lecture you, Hans, we both know that you've been a complete arsehole. Be a Big Boy and apologise to the princess at lunch."

"And if I don't?"

A rare look came across Valentin's features.

Hans had only seen it once, and that was when Valentin readily took on Ivar, Jannik, and Haldur when they kept insisting that Hans was "invisible". Granted, this would have passed off as another emotional torture for him, but when Jannik began saying that Hans "shouldn't have existed anyway", Valentin snapped and made sure that each of them earned a black eye.

He didn't even have to say anything. If he was being honest with himself, among all his brothers, his respect only rested in Valentin alone. Hans sighed in surrender, flopping himself on a chair. "Fine," he muttered.

Valentin returned to his normal self. "Well, what is it? Don't you like her?" he asked, "Personally, she _is _beautiful. Well I'll be damned, so is her sister. But by Heaven, I'm a married man and a father to two beautiful girls of my own, so I'll say no more. But what do _you_ think of her?"

"I don't know yet," Hans answered.

He had been practically boiling with anger in the short period of time he's been in the throne room, and he might have kicked down the suits of amours in the hall just beyond it had Valentin not caught up with him. He didn't think much of his affianced princess then, but Hans had always had an eye for beauty, and if there's one thing he cannot deny, Elsa _is_ beautiful, almost perfect...

… if it weren't for her little "problem".

_For Heaven__'__s sake, what if she accidentally kills me? What is she _purposely_ kills me? What if she puts out children in danger__—__?_

_No_, he thought, shaking his head, _We won__'__t have any. We__'__ll _never _have any. I don__'__t care if this kingdom doesn__'__t have an heir. Why should I be concerned? This is not my home. She__'__ll be my wife, all right, but no more than that. She__'__s not my lover. I already have many of those, and she doesn__'__t need to join the collection_.

"You're not thinking of killing yourself, are you?" Valentin suddenly said out of the blue, smirking.

"Hardly."

"Well good. Because I kind of need you to help me write a letter to Osvald detailing our _lovely _arrival before we go down to meet the princesses. And mind you, you better have an apology ready by time we're done."


	3. III - Queen

to **lolhahahano**: Thank you very much for the support, friend :) I hope I won't disappoint.

* * *

**III.**

**Queen**

* * *

As Hans had expected, Valentin and Anna practically _abandoned _him and Elsa alone in the middle of their traipse around the Arendelle Palace Gardens.

Lunch had rolled on smoothly. Mostly thanks to Valentin and his wits.

He and Anna easily conversed. They laughed together, even. But by Heaven, Elsa and Hans barely spoke a word to one another. Elsa, of course, had to offer a smile or a phrase here and there for Valentin's sake, but Hans was as silent as he could be.

And then Valentin had asked for a tour in the famous gardens of the kingdom.

At first, the two princesses were taking the lead. Eventually, Valentin found a way to separate them. He did this by offering his arm to Anna as they walked ahead, regaling her with stories and thoughtful words on how much she reminded him of one of his little girls back in the Eastern Tribunes.

Clever Valentin walked slowly, spinning stories after stories of his wild childhood back at home that Anna did not notice their unusually sluggish pace, allowing Hans and Elsa to walk in front of them.

The "tour" continued this way for several minutes, until Elsa began to notice that she could not hear Valentin anymore. She turned, thinking that the two might have stopped some paces away, but she blanched when she saw that the prince was leading Anna back to the palace, casually pointing at windows, statues, and other rubbish as he went. How the prince managed to effortlessly divert Anna away from her somehow did not surprise her anymore, given how simply clever Valentin is with his choice of words.

She looked back to see Hans staring at his brother's retreating back as well. He doesn't seem surprised either. And he's definitely not happy about it.

Elsa's heart jumped to her throat at the prospect of being alone with her fiancee for the first time. She grasped her hands together, hoping to encase her magic should it suddenly go awry due to her mounting anxiety. She doesn't know this man, and for all justifications, she did not trust him just yet, given how he had been acting and behaving in their short time together.

But she ever so grateful that he still walked alongside her, albeit silently, when she stepped forward.

She decided that if she was ever going to make this marriage somehow work, she will have to break the silence first. "So," she began before clearing her throat a little, "You're an admiral."

She mentally smacked herself in the head at how boring she sounded, but Heaven knows she simply had no idea how to start a conversation.

"Yes."

Pause.

Okay. She needs to try something better than that. She spoke up again, "You love the sea, then, Prince Hans?"

It felt weird addressing him by his name directly for the first time. As of the moment, in their engagement, she's still obliged to call him formally. She vaguely wonders what she'll call him after they were married…

Her Father and Mother called one another "Dearest". Usually when they're alone. Or when they _think _they're alone. Elsa and Anna would burst into fits of giggles whenever their parents would call each other that. They would watch their Mother blush herself silly even though her husband had been calling her that for many years.

Elsa never managed to ask how they've met. That wasn't her concern before, seeing as she had her sights on being raised as Arendelle's heir. It was one of her many regrets later. It only got worse when she discovered that she was already promised in a marriage right after her parents were gone. She would have asked so many insights from them on how marriage works, on how a king and a queen can sustain an entire country together while remain happy with a family go their own.

She was looking at him, gauging his reaction. She grew a little worried when his frown only seem to worsen.

"It was either that or I'm going to work as the Head of the Finance in the kingdom," he said, "Sailing is just an acquired taste."

_Better than staying in the damn castle_, Hans mused angrily. While nearly half of his brothers had already left the keep for the sake of their marriage overseas or in faraway lands— he realised that he, too, would soon leave its walls permanently— several of his brothers settled in with their families, and unfortunately, they were the brothers that he did not wanted to see the most.

Elsa nodded, not quite sure what to say next.

It was so easy to have a conversation with Anna. They automatically knew what to say to one another even through mere exchanges of looks and glances. She'd known Anna all her life. She knew her sister inside out, and she's certain Anna does the same with her.

Other than her sister, she never really had any reason to talk with anyone. Of course, there's Grand Pabbie, the Trolls, and Kristoff, but they were like family. Still, they never came close to the confidence and ease Anna's mere presence provides her.

With Hans, she was treading on dangerous waters. He was a _complete_ stranger. _A brooding, odd, mysterious, and kind of depressing stranger who so happens to be my fiancee_, Elsa thought bitterly. He was unlike the princes she and Anna would read about as children. Granted, Elsa had never met a "real prince" before, and she feared that she might have had high expectations for princes due to the chivalric personalities they seem to posses in romantic novels.

"May I ask her majesty a question?" Hans suddenly said, his gaze settling on hers.

Elsa steeled herself not to look away from the intensity of his eyes. "Of course," she said warily.

"Is ruling a kingdom something you love to do?" He asked, stopping on his tracks, prompting Elsa to stop with him.

She finally lowered her head. Her hands begin to automatically fidget by themselves. Her self-doubts rose again, renewed. She'd gone through this many times before in her lonesome, but she can never deny one thing: She's not yet ready.

Or rather, she _feels_ that she's not yet ready. She spent her entire life holding the weight of a crown that wasn't even placed on her head yet. Her conviction, her _only _conviction, was that she was doing this for her love for her Father. She will _not _let everything he and their ancestors established in centuries be torn asunder just because she's too afraid to sit on the throne.

"It's an acquired taste," she decided to answer.

Hans looked at her for a while, glancing every now and then at her gloves. Had he been wearing a coat, he might not have noticed the sudden shift in temperature in the air. But the cold picked on his skin of his face, and he was sure that spring air was not supposed to sting as much. Osvald specifically stated that her need to wear gloves at all times should be respected, as it was vital in maintaining her most precious secret.

He considered telling her that he knew about "demonic gift", but he decided better against it; the lesser he cared about her, the easier his life would be.

"I wish this marriage will be an acquired taste as well," he said before he could stop himself.

The air stilled.

By now, there no denying it. Elsa confirmed that Hans wasbeing so distant, so _frigid_, because he was completely against the marriage. It was ridiculous that Elsa even thought that she had done something to offend him gravely when they had just arrived. She nearly laughed at the bizarreness of the situation. As if she wasn't against it, too…

He cleared his throat and began walking again. "I've noticed several busts and marble figures all around, Your Majesty," he said in an even, calm tone, "Do you happen to know who they are?"

Elsa obliged him with the details, but she knew that he wasn't really listening. She didn't need him to.

It has been her first conversation with Hans, and she did not enjoy a single minute of it.

Yes. She _does _hope for the best that this marriage can _somehow _work out.

* * *

It's been a couple of days since the Westergaards' visit, and the preparations for her coronation began.

While the ceremony itself didn't seem to be a problem (except for the fact that she _have_ to remove her gloves to hold the sceptre and the _globus cruciger_), she was downright dismayed that they also had to host a party after it.

At her Father and Mother's behest, they _never _hosted a gathering in the castle. Their main concern, as always, was Elsa's powers. Perhaps it was a mistake on their part, for Elsa had became incredibly anxious whenever there was a large number of people present; always on the edge, her powers just brimming to the top and she would barely able to keep them at bay.

Meanwhile, Elsa have to deal with her main predicament for the party: she has a dance with her estranged fiancee.

It was a tradition, _apparently_. Had there been no marriage arrangement, she was free to chose who the lucky gentleman would oblige her first dance. She could even skip the dancing part and just accept every dignitaries' congratulatory remarks for the whole duration of the night.

But no. She _is _engaged, and she just _have _to dance with him.

_And she doesn't dance_.

"This is a disaster in the making," Elsa muttered miserably as she leaned against a table for support. She had been practicing all morning with a dancing instructor, and it was putting her patience to the test. The instructor had been with the Arendelle family for so long, and he was aware of the young princesses's magical prowess. He was also _acutely _aware of the coldness creeping into the ballroom, and he promptly left to give her some time to rest.

"I'm pretty sure you'll get the knack of it," Anna said, twirling around on her own, humming and imitating what Elsa had been trying to learn for hours now. She was excited, of course, and she had already alerted Kristoff about it. She was, however, not entirely sure if the Trolls are the best choice to teach Kristoff how to dance.

"What if he can feel that my gloves are too cold? What if my powers—?"

"Hey, hey, hey," Anna chided, rushing over to where her sister stood, "You _can _do this. Remember what father always say?"

"Yes, I know," Elsa sighed. _Conceal it, don't feel it, don't let it show_. It was a mantra that she had lived by as a child, and it had helped her ease in to adulthood even with the burden of her troublesome powers. "But there's never been so many people in the castle before, and I…"

One wrong move, one clumsy little slip, and _everyone _will know.

When a snow flake touched Anna's nose, she knew that Elsa is nearing her breaking point.

She touched Elsa's arm, prompting her sister to look at her. "You'll be fine," Anna offered with a gentle smile, "I'll be there. Oh! I almost forgot!"

She stood back, bouncing on the spot excitedly as she pulled out something she had been hiding securely in her pocket.

"I got you these!" Anna said excitedly, waving a lumpy fabric in Elsa's face. "Oh, wait, sorry. That's my handkerchief. Hang on… Here!"

She pulled out two blue gloves and held it out for Elsa to inspect. Intricate patterns were embossed on the cloth, among them the Arendelle insignia. And on the palms of the gloves, barely there and almost nonexistent, was the pattern of a large snowflake, almost the same colour of the gloves themselves.

"Go on, take it. Otherwise, it will hurt my feelings," she said when Elsa was simply staring at it, completely mesmerised. As Elsa slowly took them, Anna said, "I kind of saw them tailoring your coronation gown. Arendelle colours, of course, you know, the greenish blue and purple. The cape's purple, I mean. So I got your gloves to match the gown itself. Of course, I can't sew to save my life, so I had Gerda help. I mean, imagine if _I _was the one who made them for you—"

Elsa had tackled her into a hug, then, and she never managed to finish her line of thought.

Smiling softly, Anna held her back. They didn't say anything. They don't need to.

* * *

Hans knew she was in trouble when he saw her remove her gloves to hold the two royal regal items.

The Queen's Crown was already on her head, and she stood there, facing everyone in the chapel, as the bishop began to orate the blessing on her using the Old Language. Hans was seated near the front. He was obliged to do so, seeing that it was his future wife who was getting married. He could just make out the uncomfortable look on her face. He was close enough to see that her bare hands were practically trembling.

And maybe it was just his imagination, but he _swore _that he could see some ice starting to creep up from her hands and onto the items—

She literally threw the items back on the bishop's hands just barely after he finished his blessing. He saw her fumbling to slip the gloves back on as the crowd repeat her name. The bishop gave her small smile, and she answered it before she faced everyone.

Her eyes immediately fall on Hans. His hair was brilliantly bright and unique, and the red hair in a sea of colours had caught her attention.

The smile she gave to the bishop was still on her face. She could have been smiling at him, she could have been not. But there was a smile on her face nonetheless when she looked at him.

So he offered a small smile of his own, just for show and reciprocation, as he inclined his head to a bow.

Her heart jumped.

It was the first time she had seen him smile. The fact that he was smiling was more overwhelming than the thought that she is finally a Queen. He looked entirely different. Heaven help her heart, but she'd never thought of how handsome he actually looked. And she could feel the effect of this little change burn her cheeks.

She just hoped that she doesn't look _too _much of a blushing bride already.

She vaguely wonders if there is more to him than just a sullen, dispirited prince. She wonders if it was possible that he could, after all, be the genuine, romantic prince she'd always read about…

He tore his gaze from her all too soon as Kai stepped forward, announcing the scheduled party that night. His face was quick to return to its usual solemn look.

He did not look at her again.

* * *

She suddenly finds Hans' scarf interesting.

It is better to look at anyway than his eyes.

Eyes that never seem to leave hers.

She tried, in their first seconds dancing together, to look at him in the eyes. It was the proper thing to do while dancing with a partner. While Elsa had no problem with this at practice, she finds Hans' case entirely different. It was a challenge to look at him when he wasn't smiling, when he wasn't encouraging her. He was serious as ever as they spun around in the middle of the room while everyone looked at them.

With his hand on hers and another on her waist, her heart was beating madly as if it was tearing its way out of her body. She was also painfully aware of how close they were to each other, and she could practically feel his breath oh her forehead. The distance between them was even less than Elsa had anticipated during practice. She couldn't blame her instructor, as he had maintained a respectable distance during their trials.

Her gloves, she was sure, were freezing. She could see it in his eyes whenever she wold dare glance up at him fully. But if he felt anything— in which she was _certain _that he did— he did not react on the spot.

When their dance was over and everyone erupted into an applause, Hans led her back to the dais where the throne was, holding her hand securely in his. Everyone else milled into the floor with their partners to get ready for the next dance.

"Perhaps it would interest her majesty to calm down in a dance and remember to breathe," he said seriously and quietly so that she alone may hear it. When she worriedly glanced at the gloved hand in his grip, Hans deemed to add, "You've been so stiff at the dance, Your Highness."

Once properly stepped on the dais, Elsa hurriedly released her hand from his. She straightened up, trying to look imposing as she addressed him, "Forgive me, but I've never had a dance before."

"I wonder why is that," he said, but his eyes were on her hands, which she had placed neatly in front of her. He bowed before Elsa could say anything else, and he left to join the crowd.

"What did he say?" Anna asked next to her.

Elsa wanted to reply, but she realised Anna was not entirely focused. She could see her sister getting agitated at the crowd of noblewomen crowding Kristoff in a corner. Kristoff, dressed in a fine gentleman's attire he and Anna had shopped together, looked greatly uncomfortable, and he kept glancing at Anna's direction apologetically while trying to answer the ladies' questions.

Elsa sighed. "Go to him," she said.

Anna's irritation died instantaneously as she turned to her sister. "Elsa, I promised I won't leave you—"

"It's okay, I'll be fine," Elsa said with a smile, "Besides, you could invite those women to go ice harvesting with you in the near future. I'm sure they'll be delighted at your skill of sending people underneath the ice."

Anna grinned at her, squeezing her hand thankfully, before taking off to Kristoff's aid.

While accepting congratulatory praises, Elsa could not shake off the feeling that Hans, for some reason, knew about her powers. She admitted that she had been greatly nervous, and she was sure that her gloves had been unpleasantly cold against his hand despite the fact that he was wearing gloves of his own.

"Prince Hans, may I have a word with you?" she finally asked, her anxiety getting the better of her as she looked for him in the crowd.

Hans broke off his conversation with Valentin and his wife, all three of them bowing, before he answered, "Certainly, Your Majesty."

At the balcony, alone and secluded, Elsa paced anxiously, mindlessly wringing her hands as she went.

Hans raised an eyebrow at her sudden need for conversation, yet they were both just standing there, doing nothing productive. "Is there something Her Majesty would like to discuss—?"

"Are you aware of something you're not supposed to know?"

Heaven forbid that she had lost all social graces, but she was scared.

Scared that her powers might frighten off Prince Hans. Scared that, having no way out of this forsaken arranged marriage, Prince Hans may not see her the same way ever again. Scared of an empty marriage…

Hans thought of confessing that he knew. But what will he gain out of it?

There was a strange satisfaction in seeing the distressed look on the Queen's face. Was it his way of rebelling against the marriage? To torture his wife into the uncertainty that she might drive away her husband because of her infernal magic?

That does sound promising.

After all, this was how his brothers had managed to hurt him when they could no longer do so physically: _play with his mind_.

"Is there something her majesty is not telling me?" Hans asked her, pretending to look curious.

Elsa was quiet for a long time, looking straight into his eyes. Hans did not waver, arching an eyebrow for added effect.

Finally, Elsa turned around, sighing. "I'm sorry. Never mind. Forget that I've said anything."

"I realise that I haven't congratulated Her Majesty just yet," Hans suddenly said.

Elsa turned to look at him again. Her heart thudded painfully loud in her chest when Hans dropped to one knee, took her hand, and kissed it.

"My Queen," he said solemnly, bowing his head.

He was sure that he had gotten his desired effect when they saw the faint blush tainting the Queen's cheeks in the waning moonlight.

Perhaps he should feel guilt about the deception that he was beginning to solidify as a plan in his head, but Heaven forbid that he should feel pity for her.


	4. IV - Din Tro Tjener

to **Phone2014: **I love Valentin very much, too :) || to ** An ****Unknown Foreign Beauty**: Hopefully :) I want to see this through to the end, too. And thank you very much for the cover. I love the design and concept behind it :)

* * *

**IV.**

**Din Tro Tjener**

* * *

Try as he might, Hans cannot offer Osvald an explanation why his brother was sent to the infirmary sporting a bleeding thigh.

Haldur had invited Hans to go hunting with him to past the time, and while there, being the arsehole that he was, he began to test his younger brother's sensitive anger.

"I heard the Queen of Arendelle just made you her Consort," Haldur said offhandedly, smirking, as the two of them rested near a creek. "_Consort_. Not her King."

"It's her _right_," Hans forced through pressed lips as he glared at the running water, "It's her country. It's her rules. The invitation for marriage came from _them_, Haldur, and _they _have the right to make her spouse a King or a Consort."

A letter came through yesterday after Valentin had departed for the Eastern Tribunes. It was a formal response to Osvald's terms of negotiation with the Queen, containing the royal seal and her signature, informing them that upon their upcoming marriage, Hans was to be her Prince Consort, and that the proposed naval port for Hans' fleet was to begin its construction.

Hans could care less for the damn throne. To hell with that if he has an entire army under his command. He could conquer his own kingdom anytime he wanted. He just don't think that Arendelle is a good country for a conquest, seeing as it it ruled by a Queen with horrifying demonic ice powers.

Haldur smirked, paused, and then deemed to say, "Hey, Hans, I have a joke for you."

Hans rolled his eyes. "Pray tell," he muttered.

"The throne of Arendelle."

Hans waited for he rest of the line, but when his brother just looked at him, he frowned. "I don't get it…"

Haldur grinned. "Oh I know you _never _will."

Hans may or may not have "accidentally" landed an arrow on his brother's leg mere hours later while they were hunting after young stag.

_Can Her Majesty even blame me for being such an arsehole with a family like this?_

* * *

"Remind me again why he has to come here?"

"Anna, I have to meet him again before we… Well, the King of the Southern Isles wanted to send him over so…"

Anna was silent and doesn't question the continuous downpour of snow in the Queen's study. If Elsa had not been dissipating the snow hour or so, Anna was sure that her desk and shelves will be lost under the thick pile of it.

Her sister has been on the brink of her sanity lately. She could try to pull off a bravado and maintain her cool calm as she wanders through the halls or meet dignitaries and diplomats in the throne room, but Anna just simply knew her sister all too well to immediately realise that her first months as Queen did not bode her well.

The castle was simply too… _open_.

Too accessible, too welcoming.

Within a week after her coronation alone, the castle had so many guests than it ever had in years.

Foreign visitors were granted more access into Arendelle, and even the people were allowed to mill around the courtyard or visit her in the throne room for appeals or offerings in selected hours.

They were dangers to the discovery of her powers.

It was teetering Elsa into a nervous breakdown. So many people. All the lives she could harm with a clumsy little slip of her accursed magic…

And as if the paperwork wasn't suicide enough. Piles and piles of letters and documents came through after the gates of Arendelle finally opened after so many years, and reading diligently through them all had made it necessary for her to stay up until ungodly hours before dawn.

_Perhaps getting married after all will tone this all down_, Elsa thought ruefully, impatiently and uncharacteristically shrugging off snow from her shoulders as she tried to take in the economic report on her desk. _Even if it means I have to endure all those sudden mood swings and the uncertainty of him discovering my powers…_

Maybe it was one of the reasons why she designated him as a Consort.

She had spent at least a couple of days on deliberating whether or not to designate him as a king or her consort. The two almost did not differ, only as a consort, it stresses that Hans would "simply" be her husband as a queen regnant.

A mere husband, not an equal.

It bothers her that she doesn't see her husband (_Future husband, mind you_, she admonished herself) as her equal, but she's not feeling quite attached to him just yet.

She still doesn't trust him.

Anna watched her for a while, calculating the right moments to speak up in attempts to calm her sister down. Heaven forbid that someone was to look up and see that the Queen's study was practically bathed in an early winter.

When it was clear through Elsa's pained and forced smile at Anna's latest quip that she wanted to be left alone, Anna did excuse herself.

Elsa was, in all her peculiarities and uniqueness, still very human.

And humans are fragile little things. They're going to need something, or better yet, someone, to keep them from falling apart.

"Hey, don't forget to go down for dinner tonight, all right?" Anna added as she stood by the door, "You better, or I'll be bringing up carrot soup."

Elsa paused to look at her. "You know I don't like carrot soup, right?"

"Which is why that is the one I'm bringing up. Serves you right for forgoing Chocolate and Marshmallow night last week," Anna said, smirking.

Elsa sighed, but she was beginning to smile as well. The flow of snow in the room eased up a bit. "I'd rather build a snowman and use the carrot for better purposes."

"I'm serious about the soup, though," Anna said, grinning as she kept her chin up as an unspoken act of challenge.

Elsa held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay, you win."

"I always do," Anna countered happily. _Only because you always let me win_, she added in her head.

"Is that another challenge?"

"Why don't we discuss this over dinner?"

"Oh, clever you. Fine," Elsa said, smiling as she turned to the next document that needed her attention. "I'll see you in five hours."

Anna left her study then, contented by the soft smile that had stayed on her sister's face as she closed the door behind her.

* * *

Osvald just _had _to insist on another visit before the wedding.

As Hans was being escorted alone to the throne room by man named Kai, he "tried" to come up with conversations that might interest the Queen.

_Tried_.

He had to remind himself that Valentin had been with him in his last visit. It was Valentin who did all the talking, mostly. There is no Valentin to speak for him now. The fact that he didn't seem to have made a good impression to the Queen and her sister (He swore that he saw Princess Anna glare at him on his way out of the castle during the Coronation party) gave him the sense to try and act like the Queen's fiancee for once.

He didn't think he was ready, though, when the doors had opened, and the Queen was already sitting on her throne, waiting for him. There was no expression on her face, but he could tell that she incredibly tense the way her body was so straight, so stiff, as she sat there.

"Your Majesty," he bowed dutifully before straightening up.

A second had passed.

And then a suffocating silence took over.

_Say something_, Hans said in his mind. Whether he was addressing to himself or to Queen Elsa, he had no idea. The pause between them was getting more and more awkward each passing second and someone has to eventually break it. _Say something. Anything…_

He found it ridiculous that with the extensive vocabulary he had used on countless women, he could not find the right words to charm the Queen. And he think that she was easy enough to be swayed, seeing as her limited interaction with strangers over the years made her anxious and highly hyperactive in conversations with anyone other than her sister.

Elsa sat uncomfortably, waiting for Hans to say something. _Anything_.

Valentin isn't here, and so is Anna. There was no one to intermediate the conversation.

She still remembered the way they had departed during her night of her coronation.

He was among the first to leave the party, but he dutifully bid his goodbye before he did. He had stepped up to the dais and bowed, leaving a kiss on her knuckles before turning around and exiting the room. He didn't even look at her as he said goodbye, but he spared her a glance just as the doors behind him closed.

Elsa didn't know what to make of it. He was approaching her and pushing her away at the same time, and then pulling back in again. Granted, both of them were just forced into the marriage, but Elsa _swears_ upon her Father's tombstone that she was _trying_.

Trying to keep Arendelle from falling apart _and _force herself to be satisfied with the marriage _he _had also thrown on her shoulders.

"I hope Her Majesty is well?" Hans began, disregarding the lack of things he could have said but cannot find the words to do so.

_No_, Elsa thought ruefully, but she wasn't about to tell him that. She might have blurted out an entire novel to Anna if her sister had prompted that question, but Hans didn't have to know about all the drama in her life. It wasn't part of the agreement of their so-called marriage.

"Yes," she answered, mentally kicking herself when she heard her voice waver at the singular word.

Hans wasn't an idiot, and he knows what a distressed lady looks and sounds like. If he was being honest with himself, it was how he had left most of his lovers when he left for voyages. At any event when he would return to the women's countries, he would act as if he never knew, as if he didn't spend his time, effort, and even money on winning their affections.

"If only there was someone who loved you," he would tell them and watch their world crumble.

They were nothing but mere dalliances and infatuations, but to them, he was their entire existence. He supposed this made him feel important and wanted unlike the situation back at home.

_Funny how I'm thinking about this when my fiancee is just in plain sight_, Hans mused.

"Would it interest Her Majesty if I were to inspect the site of my naval port in Arendelle?" he asked out loud, suddenly remembering the topic as he recalled standing on his ship he sailed away from broken-hearted women and his demon-spawned brothers.

"Oh," Elsa uttered, remembering why she has to upgrade the trade in the kingdom; to fund the barracks of her fiancee, "Of course. I would like to accompany you."

She has to see the area for herself. She might have to bring an architect and an engineer with her to discuss the cost of such a large construction in the kingdom.

He had no choice but to agree to her companionship, but he doesn't appreciate that they have to share a carriage to get there. They might as well have ridden the damn thing all alone with the silence that was shared between them.

As they both stood at the docks while the architect ordered his men to survey the location, Hans noticed how the Queen seemed to get restless as she continuously to glance anxiously at the churning water underneath the docks.

It was none of his business, surely, but as a man who had been out in the sea so much, he just had to ask what was his fiancee's problem with water. "Is there something bothering Her Majesty?"

Elsa straightened up next to him, fixing her eyes at the architect's men instead. "No," she muttered, mouth pressed firmly.

Hans resisted to roll his eyes, but he wasn't successful. "I beg to differ, Your Grace." He could practically feel the cold radiating from her next to him.

Anxiety getting the better of her, Elsa does admit that she did not trust the wooden floor separating them from the sea. Head held high to prevent her fear from showing, she said coolly, "I've never been this close to sea before, Prince Hans."

Hans paused. "You're afraid of the water," he interpreted.

Elsa felt shame manifesting in her chest. She was not even allowed to step out of the castle, let alone take a dip in the sea. She never learned how to swim. It was one of the things she left out in her regrettable childhood.

"I'm not," she answered defensively.

"No, you're afraid of drowning. You can't swim," Hans continued smugly, thinking the same line of thought as Elsa.

Elsa fidgeted her gloved hands agitatedly. "It isn't a necessary skill. It's not needed," she muttered, much to her chagrin. _Why does he insist on bringing this up? What does he want to achieve with this?_

"It's a necessary skill for survival," Hans continued nonetheless, incredibly pleased at the discovery of one of her weaknesses. He was even tempted to push her off the docks just to see what will happen.

"There are ships and boats that can help with transportation," Elsa said, clenching her hands into fists to keep her powers from acting up.

"Which can sink in the middle of the ocean," Hans added, smirking.

She bristled at the comment.

She snaps.

A strong gust of freezing wind from his side nearly pushed Hans off the docks. Indignant, as he regained his footing, he saw that Elsa was staring out into the ocean, a glare marring her usually calm features.

"My Father and my Mother," Elsa began, her voice dangerously low that Hans suddenly felt the need to distance from her as much as possible, "They were lost at sea."

She didn't even seem to care that she had let some of her magic slip from her control. The fact that he had been incredibly insensitive enough that it had led them to talk about _this_. Even she and Anna never talked about it, if they can help it.

Hans straightened, glancing at everyone nearby to check if someone had offhandedly seen the Queen act strangely. Everyone seemed to be doing their daily routine, thankfully.

Normally, ships sinking in the middle of nowhere in the ocean wouldn't have been a great deal. He had come to accept this as a normalcy when he had accepted the job of being an admiral. He knew that the princesses of Arendelle were orphaned, but he didn't know the cause of their parents' death. _He _was an orphan himself, but he knew better than to dwell at the past. But looking at how fragile yet dangerous the Queen is now, he doubted that he would be talking about ships in a long time.

"I'm sorry, Your Highness," he said quietly with a bow. He does have to admit: she was frightening when she's mad. He mentally stored this information in his mind in preparation for their upcoming marriage.

She did not answer him. Without looking at him, she walked back to the carriage, saying over her shoulder, "Take all the time you need. I'll just be in the carriage."

He gave her about fifteen minutes to her lonesome before he joined her on the ride back. He doubted that she'll be back on the docks soon after the triggered memory. If anything, she was glaring at the ocean as she looked outside the carriage window. It was noticeably cold in the small enclosure, too, but she didn't seem to notice nor care. Once reaching the castle, she even took off without so much as saying goodbye.

She dutifully stood by the palace gates that evening to see him off, though, but she wasn't smiling.

Hans would have left without further exchange of words, but he saw that the look in her eyes did not mean that she was still angered at his roguish display earlier. She was merely sad, _tired_. She still wanted to see him off. She was making an effort to come in terms of their marriage.

And he could only dream of reciprocating all that.

He was still angry, still unquestioningly enraged, that he had to be wed to a witch.

But for his father, for the Southern Isles, as Valentin had put it, he will hold this facade enough as long as he need to.

"Your Majesty, I did not mean to offend—"

"It's okay. You didn't know," she said quietly, feeling spent. She had devoted most of her afternoon sorting out documents to forget the morning's events. She had come to the thought that Hans was not altogether insensitive, no. She can't blame him. He didn't know how her parents had died.

He was not satisfied to leave the Queen in such a state. He doesn't want to risk the chance of getting an earful of admonishments from Osvald should Elsa write a letter complaining about his rudeness. Pulling off an all too familiar act of comforting women, Hans cautiously took her hand and placed a kiss on her knuckles, murmuring, "_Min Dronning, jeg er din tro tjener_."

_My Queen, I am your faithful servant._

Elsa felt her cheeks aflame as Hans released her hand and retreated to the carriage that will bring him to his ship. He had said it in one of the spoken languages of the Southern Isles folk, but Elsa was nearly adept in all the languages of the countries that surrounded Arendelle that she automatically understood him.

He turned just before he got in and added, "In two months, Your Majesty."

Elsa nodded, speechless still, as he departed.

Indeed. In two months, there will be a grand wedding in Arendelle.

She sighed heavily as she watched his carriage roll away into the waning light of the dying day.

_Might as well get this over with._

* * *

**\- Helpful Notes- **

_**Din Tro Tjener** \- _"Your Faithful Servant". The title of the chapter is in Danish, where the Southern Isles was estimated to be. Denmark is also home to the writer of the "The Snow Queen", Hans Christian Andersen.

**Prince Consort** \- As defined by Wikipedia, the husband of a queen regnant who is not himself king in his own right.


	5. V - Primas Noctis

**V****.**

**Primas Noctis**

* * *

She begins the morning of her wedding by visiting the dead.

Elsa supposed that more or less it wasn't a good practice, but there was no one else to turn to but the dead man who was responsible for her unwanted wedding day.

She debated on whether or not she should wake Anna, but she eventually decided against it. She needn't bother her sister's peaceful world. Besides, it had always visibly upset Anna whenever Elsa would prompt a visit to their parents' empty graves.

It's not that Anna doesn't want to visit their parents' tombstones. It's just that it had always bothered her that their parents' bodies were never recovered and that they were literally lamenting over mere memorials. Their Father and Mother are still out there, drifting aimlessly across the vast expanse of the ocean along the many other souls onboard their ship on that tragic day nearly three years ago.

The day was still young; premature, even. The fog still hung about in the air, and the skies were still bathed in the cool blue of night. It was cold, of course, but not that it bothered Elsa. Cold is what she is, what she _feels_ all the time.

Especially today.

Should she get any colder, she would have been numb.

In fact, she wished she were.

After offering a small prayer for her Mother, she stepped in front of her Father's tombstone, and let herself sit on the grassy ground.

Everything seemed grey that morning, just like the day the tombstones were set up for her parents' funeral. Elsa clutched the cloak around her shoulders, her fingers clenching on the fabric as she stared at her Father's name, which had been etched permanently on the cold, unfeeling stone.

Was she angry at him?

Partially, she decided. He could have chosen a better husband for her. Did he even hand-picked Hans himself among his thirteen brothers?

Well, she couldn't ask him now, can she?

"Do you think I'm doing a good job so far?" Elsa said out loud to the stone, rocking slightly on the ground as she stared up at his name. She supposed that it had always felt kind of awkward talking to a stone, but somehow, she does believe that her Father is listening to her somewhere. She laughed softly, "It's been… difficult. You said so yourself. It's very difficult to do things on my own. But I'll be stronger because of it. You said it would _make_ me stronger. I'm still holding on to that until now… All those words ever gave me was the will to wake up everyday and to _not _fail you, to continue all that you've ever worked for. I'm _trying_. I _swear_ that I am… What difference will it make I'm married to _him_?"

She felt like the same thirteen year old she was in what it felt like a lifetime ago, in her Father's study, helplessly lamenting her condemned life as the Queen-to-be. Were her Father alive now, she was sure that he will still say the same things to her.

Elsa sighed heavily, tiredly, as she inhaled the scent of the cool morning air enveloping her. "For you, Father. I will make this work. For you."

* * *

The Kings of the Southern Isles had been granted a large mausoleum for their remains to be buried in.

Naturally, Hans would find the remains of his Father and his ancestors down there. The place was almost akin to sacred grounds that none of the princes of the Southern Isles even dared to defile it in any way.

Regrettably, Valentin could not come, as his wife was due to give birth to another child soon. Osvald had already stated that he has other "more important" matters to attend to. As for his other brothers, well…

At least, there was someone who wouldn't turn his back on him. Even if that man has been dead for several years now.

The underground burial ground was cold and haunting at the early hours of dawn, but Hans couldn't bring himself to care. He was there for his Father, and that was all the reassurance he needed. Holding a lamp in one hand, Hans knelt in front of the marble sarcophagus that was modelled after his Father, heedless of the sepulchral silence, of the looming shadows in every corner.

"Suppose that I just lie down here, how long do you think it will take them to find me?" Hans began, chills creeping up his spine at the sound of his voice echoing with absolute clarity the mausoleum. Each sound that rebounded back to him might have been a phantom's whisper. He chuckled, "I suppose they'll only find me down here when Osvald is dead. And I imagine that while he's given a King's Last Rights, I would most likely be thrown into the sea with my feet tied to weights. Frej and Flemming would love that idea…"

His Father's remains continued to be silent.

"I've come to say goodbye. It's my wedding today, you see. I'm sorry I haven't told you sooner. I haven't visited you in a while. In fact, I won't be visiting you in long, long while, I think. Moving to Arendelle and all…"

He had forgotten how awkward it was to talk to a corpse.

He remembered visiting him every night for the first three months after he was interred. A scared young man among the dead, his heart the only thing beating and living among the bones and dusts of his ancient fathers.

Eventually, though, as strange as it seems, it would feel as though he was merely visiting his Father in his bedroom as he used to do every night when the King was still alive. Even in death, it feels as though the late King was still the only one who ever gave him comfort and solace.

Hans exhaled heavily. "You wanted me to be happy. It's easy to make a promise. You said I deserved something better than what this family has to offer. I guess you're right. But nothing's better with _her_."

The lamp flickered for a while, fleetingly bathing him in darkness. Darkness doesn't bother him. He had spent most of his childhood suffocating in closets after one of his brothers had locked him in, or otherwise he would hide himself until he was sure that he wasn't the subject of torture anymore. In the darkness, he is safe. Darkness is where he belonged.

Once the light had stabilised again, Hans stared at his Father's name for one last time. He was to leave for Arendelle in an hour. He'll never know when he'll be back down here again, just like this, in the silence and solace of the dead.

"For you, Father. I'll make this work for you."

* * *

"You'll be okay?"

"I'll be fine, Anna."

"Promise you won't freeze the fjord?"

"Anna."

"You know I was kidding, right?"

Elsa smiled, but it didn't exactly reach her eyes.

And Anna could see that. And it rips painfully at her heartstrings to see that her sister was absolutely miserable on the day of her wedding.

Elsa anxiously tugged at her white gloves, which Gerda and Anna had personally tailored for her. It was plain, just as Elsa's preference in style, save for the gold borders at her sleeve. Anna personally saw to it that they were thick enough, knowing that Elsa will need the security of her gloves the most on her wedding day.

"Stop making such a fuss. You look beautiful," Anna said softly, hoping to calm her down as she readjusts her sister's veil.

"_You're _making a fuss," Elsa countered, "I told you, I'm fine. Is Kai ready?"

"As he'll ever be," Anna answered, busying herself with the hem of Elsa's gown to ease her own anxiety.

Elsa would have preferred Grand Pabbie to give her away on her wedding day, but she knew that the Arendelle folk are not aware of the existence of Trolls. It would cause an uproar should one of them be spotted. Kristoff was there, though, to represent them. It fell to Kai to bring her to the altar.

All too soon, the bells of the cathedral had rang out.

Elsa felt as though an ice had stabbed her heart.

She wished that was the case.

Anna straightened up and steadily looked at her. Elsa simply stared back, blood completely drained from her face. She looked as though she was ready to faint. It grew cold in the room, but it thankfully, it didn't snow.

And then Anna smiled softly. "Ready?"

Elsa inhaled sharply, and dragged her breath out though her lips as if it was a tedious chore. "Hopefully," she sighed.

* * *

He didn't look at her throughout most of the wedding.

Granted, he watched along with everyone as Elsa walked down the isle in the arm of the Headservant, Kai. He thought it was kind of a poor choice, because normally, a Queen wouldn't have to march accompanied by a mere servant. He had to admire her attempts at subtlety, though, when he saw a large, but pale embroidery of a snowflake across her stomach.

He held her hand as she let go of Kai's arm, letting her join him at the dais. He gave her a courteous, formal nod, but he did not even look at her. They sat through most of the Bishop's homily, with him holding her hand.

And it wasn't comforting, Elsa thought. It was _suffocating_. Arendelle was watching behind her; the man joining them stood in front of her; and the man she was to be wed with was keeping her in place by holding her hand.

She felt trapped more than anything.

They didn't have to suffer the continuous ignorance of each other's company for so long when it was finally time to bless their rings.

"Velsigne denne ringen, og gi at han som gir det og hun som skal bruke den kan forbli trofast mot hverandre, og blir i din fred og favør, og leve sammen i kjærlighet til livet 'enden," said the Bishop.

_Bless this ring, and grant that he who gives it and she who shall wear it may remain faithful to each other, and abide in thy peace and favour, and live together in love until their lives' end._

He had to slip the wedding ring to her bare finger, of course. She paused just then, prompting the Bishop to clear his throat and hesitantly repeat his instruction, politely asking her remove her gloves.

And she did. And her hands were literally _freezing_.

But Hans did not flinch. He was supposed to be unaware of her powers, right? He slipped the white gold ring on her finger, feeling her whole hand shake in his grasp, as he pronounced his vows. His vows were empty in his ears, meaningless as they passed his lips.

She did the same to him, looking up at him, resolute, _determined_. She had to remind him, of course, who has the higher power between the two of them. She said her vows, but they sounded hollow and said in a voice that she did not recognise as her own.

After several other ceremonies and procedures, Bishop had might as well condemned them to a death sentence.

"De som Himmelen har sammenføyd, skal ikke noe menneske skille."

_Those whom Heaven hath joined together, __let no man put asunder_.

The Bishop presents them to the applauding audience, and together, they turned around, hands clasped, rings gleaming on their fingers.

A stranger who is now married to a stranger.

* * *

Elsa wasn't stupid nor clueless.

She knows how bloodlines continue. By Heaven, she even knew how she and Anna were formed, though the specifics and the details of _how_ always burned shame into her cheeks.

And most importantly, almost in all cultures, a couple is not considered completely married until they — Elsa had to swallow hard and remember how to function— consummate the marriage.

It was absurd, ludicrous beyond reason, that she has to share and sleep in the same room with a stranger who so happens to be her husband, let alone do other… _things_. Things that she can't even bring herself to say or even think, if she can help it.

Hans didn't even do the traditional carrying-the-bride-through-the-door romantic nonsense. After the wedding reception, he had only mutely followed Elsa to their suite. Her heart had been hammering frantically the whole time, cheeks lit aflame, and her gloved hands wringing each other mindlessly.

However, she had been surprised and thankful— and _strangely_ _disappointed_— when Hans had opted to change into his sleepwear while she carried on to tediously removing her gown.

"Let me help you with that," he muttered when he saw her struggling with the buttons on her back.

Her cheeks hadn't calmed down, but she allowed him to proceed with a nod, unable to form a cohesive sentence. She was hyperaware of everything in that moment when she felt his bare, warm, and nimble fingers fumble with the buttons that she didn't manage to cover. She could feel the warmth of his steady breathing against her neck, which made her realise that she should have probably freed her hair its bun—

"There," he said quietly, withdrawing to lie down on the side of the bed he now claimed as his own.

Elsa watched him go, seeing how simply tired Hans looked as he visibly tried to restrain himself from simply flopping down on the bed.

Just before he completely jumped in, he straightened up and looked at her from where she stood by the door, saying softly, "God natt, min Dronning."

_Good night, my Queen._

Her heart skipped. It was spoken in the Old Language of the Arendelle folk, a language nearly dead and spoken only by a few people now.

And then he simply lied down, facing away from her.

Several minutes later, sure that her husband— _By Heaven, calling him that is so surreal_, she thought— was fast asleep, she used her magic to call forth a gentle wind that had extinguished all candles in the room, engulfing them in the dark blue glow of the night.

She gingerly lied down, faced the ceiling, wondering why being newly wed felt so empty. She turned her head, seeing a faint silhouette of Hans, already sound asleep, beside her, mere inches next to her.

_Will you still call me your wife, your Queen, if you knew what I am? _

And then she slipped on her gloves.

_To be sure_.

* * *

**\- Helpful Notes-**

**_Primas Noctis_**: In Latin. Can also be _Primae Noctis_. It means, "The First Night".


	6. Vi - Cold

to **Phone2014**_: _I intend to do just that, thank you for noticing :) | to **An Unknown Foreign Beauty**: I aim to please :) About Hans not wanting the throne... We shall remedy that. Thank you for the continuous support, friend. | to **Jacob Flores** : I'm working on it, mate, don't worry. Yeah, this _might _take its sweet time. We'll see :)

Thanks for all support, friends. I'll try not to get seriously retarded while drafting a better plot.

* * *

**VI****.**

**Cold**

* * *

Valentin didn't know whether to laugh or react negatively.

"… Come again?" He asked softly, still not sure how to appropriately respond to Hans.

"The Queen. She made me sleep in a separate room from hers," Hans responded despondently.

"You haven't been married for more than a week and she's already kicking you out of the bedroom?" Valentin mused.

Hans rolled his eyes. "She did't _kick me out_. She's just…"

_Paranoid_.

There was no better way to describe it.

Every night, Elsa had been sleeping next to him wearing her gloves. He doesn't question her even though he knew the reason behind it. He doesn't want to prompt a conversation with her _at all_, if he can help it.

A couple of nights ago, however, she spent an ungodly amount of hours trapped in her study with mountains of documents to sort. She barely even had the sense to change into her nightgown, and Hans wasn't surprised when she collapsed on bed without even bothering to slip on her gloves. He should know, since the said gloves were on the same table where he had been reading Valentin's letters.

The immense stress seems to be unfitting for the Queen's health, as it gave her a restless night.

And by daybreak, the windows were already fogged up from the numbing cold that has been circulating the room for hours.

Hans had been pretending to sleep when she bolted upright next to him, silently panicking at the sight of her magic manifesting right under her husband's nose. He wasn't able to sleep properly, much to his irritation, as the cold issued forth by Elsa's magic had been nearly unbearable. Elsa didn't seem to notice that he was already awake, as her panic made her to solely focus on getting her hands covered with her gloves.

"It was cold last night," Hans muttered distastefully at breakfast later that day, adequately angry and annoyed at the disturbance in his sleep pattern. For the sake of casualness, he added, "Did you feel it as well?"

In retrospect, he shouldn't have brought it up.

He remembered that Elsa shook her head silently, and they didn't speak to one another again for the whole morning. By noon, as he was overseeing the construction of the naval barracks by the docks, he received a message from the Queen, telling him that his personal effects had all been moved to an adjoining room next to her own.

Valentin shrugged. "I should have visited you sooner. Obviously, your marriage is going on _splendidly_. How's life in Arendelle anyway for the last five days? Maybe in that short span of time, you have somehow offended her majesty?"

"Shouldn't be the first time I've offended a monarch, have I?" Hans muttered as he and Valentin continued their walk around the Arendelle Gardens.

He was referring to Osvald. He was sure he had been a pain in his brother's side, sailing from port to port and causing trouble in his wake.

In fact, as the years rolled on, Osvald seem to grow lesser and lesser like their Father, no matter how much they resemble each other now. He was easily angered, easily swayed by his pride and emotions. He had become so obsessed with expanding the territory of the Southern Isles. Hans could now see why Osvald had strongly insisted that he was to be married to the Queen of Arendelle, but it doesn't make Osvald less disappointed when he found out that Hans was to become a "mere Consort", not a King.

"Osvald is old and he's prone to act like all old men do," Valentin added, "They tend to become more bitter and deranged, especially if they're wearing crowns on their heads."

"Father wasn't like him," Hans said defensively.

"I know. It must be something with Osvald's mother, then. It runs in the blood, they say. I _knew _she was a bitch," Valentin said casually.

He was relieved to see a small smile grace the corners of Hans' lips.

"You didn't happen to… disappoint her in bed, have you?" Valentin asked.

"I haven't _touched _her, if that's what you're implying," Hans said nonchalantly.

"Oh, no wonder she's mad at you."

Hans groaned, but otherwise now in higher spirits. Valentin had a natural gift in making things better.

For the last five days in Arendelle, his everyday life fell into a dreadfully dull routine.

He would wake up, and have breakfast with the Queen. Anna had joined them once, only on the morning after the wedding. But the tense silence had prompted her to find excuses everyday to leave the table early. She only stuck around long enough every morning to greet her sister or to snag a toast or two.

Mornings would be spent apart. He was granted his own office, and he conducted his affairs there all on his own. Elsa had forwarded diplomatic themed letters and documents for him to handle after browsing through them. She herself handled trade and internal affairs of her country. He would knock every now and then if a lost trade document was jumbled into his pile, or when he had finished a particular set of documents that needed her signature and the royal seal.

With spare time, he would go down to the docks and oversee the construction of the naval barracks while the Queen would open the throne room to personally listen to the plights and the pleas of the Arendelle folk.

Lunch was nearly as bad as breakfast, but at least, Anna would sit with them.

At afternoon, he would return to the docks, or he would write to Valentin. He wrote to Osvald as well, reporting his progress. His letters to the King of the Southern Isles were formal and businesslike, much like how he was acting with Elsa. But his letters to Valentin might as well be a gripping, detailed novel.

At dinner, Elsa would ask him about his day, and he would report his progress with the barracks or elaborate on the documents he had read through.

She would just nod. She doesn't praise him for his efforts, nor comment on any errors, should he have any. She doesn't discuss with him own _her _progress, nor other affairs of _her_ country.

He might as well apply as her secretary and get the same treatment still.

And then the two of them would go to sleep without so much as a word to one another. He could only be thankful that this particular segment of the schedule was to take place in a room of his own. In fact, the distance only seem to make everything better by a small fraction.

As the dawn breaks, everything would repeat itself.

It was maddening.

This is not a home. It's a prison.

He wasn't a her husband. He wasn't her Consort. He was her _servant_.

_This isn't marriage_, Hans thought, seething malevolently, _This is a death sentence._

* * *

He started carrying a sword around.

Elsa was sure that her own husband was plotting to kill her ever since she indirectly told him that they were going to sleep in separate rooms. Since then, he was never seen without a sword strapped to his belt. He even meticulously props it against the table whenever they eat meals.

No one questions it, of course. He was the husband of their Sovereign, and he was a military man. Surely, a sword by his side seemed like a normalcy.

But the Queen's own sister does.

"I say we confiscate that thing before someone looses an eye," Anna muttered as she watched the carriage bringing Hans to the docks exit the Palace gates.

"He's not hurting anyone with it," Elsa said offhandedly as she tried to file the notes on her desk. She had lost interest in going further after her eyes begin to prickle, and she'll just have to try and finish them all tomorrow.

"_Yet_," Anna added, frowning.

Elsa really couldn't complain. Her workload had been a whole lot lighter, thanks to her husband. Since trade had obviously didn't interest him, he handled foreign diplomacies, seeing as he was more adept with the leaders, customs, and trends of other countries better than she does. Granted, his time as an Admiral allowed him to travel in several lands in the name of the Southern Isles.

He was efficient, she agrees, but she doesn't quite trust him yet in handling matters that concern the country itself. He was, nonetheless, a stranger still, regardless if he was her Consort. It was one of the many reasons why Elsa hadn't granted him a copy of the royal seal of Arendelle. The finalisation of Hans' handiwork always had to pass her approval first.

Elsa was quiet for a moment as she puts the royal seal away in a hidden compartment so that no one else can use it. And then she said quietly, "He has a very good reason to keep himself protected."

Anna paused. She doesn't react, but Elsa can see the sudden shift in her eyes. "He knows?"

Elsa sighed heavily— though it sounded more like an anguished groan— as she let herself ease against her seat. "_I don't know_," she admitted.

The implications were becoming too many and too frightening for her to ignore anymore.

He eyes her gloves more often than he dared admit, but he never questions them. She was certain that he felt the coldness of her hands when they touched as they danced and when they made their vows, but he must've chosen not to react.

And then a couple of days ago, he _finally _voiced out the anomaly.

The coldness of the room.

And what did she do?

Instead of justifying the odd temperature, of brushing the comment off, _she sent him into another room_.

She had mentally beaten herself over the fact that she could have done a thousand of things to level the situation. But the panic, the _fear_, had acted up first. In her paranoia, she had shut her own husband out, further damaging their already strained relationship.

_But does he really know about my powers? Suppose that he knew, does he intend to kill me because of it? _

"You know, I'm not one to talk but…" Anna began hesitantly, "You should ask him."

Elsa shook her head tiredly, feeling magic radiating on her fingers within the confines of her gloves at the thought of confronting him while he was armed. "It will only make it worse than it already is…"

"If there's one thing I've learned with Kristoff, it's that we have to be honest with one another," Anna continued, "It will make everything else work."

Elsa tried not to feel a stab of jealousy.

It was obvious how healthy Anna and Kristoff's blooming "more-than-friends" relationship had been.

They might as well have been a couple that has been married for years. They knew each other so well. There were simply no secrets between the two of them. More often than Anna would admit, she would voice out how much she missed Kristoff's constant presence if they had not met for more than three days. It's not that Elsa did not provide her companionship. Elsa just understood that Kristoff provided a different kind of emotional bond than what she and Anna share as sisters.

"It's too soon," Elsa said, "Or rather, it's too late. it would have better if he had known before the wedding. By heaven, the marriage is barely a week old and _this _is supposed to make it better?"

"Okay, okay, we'll take it slowly, shall we?" Anna said cautiously, moving to sit on Elsa's desk, "At least ask him about the sword? I'm no Admiral, but carrying a sword around your own house for no apparent and obvious reason is far too sketchy."

Elsa sighed again as the first snow flake touched her nose. "To make sure that he's not going to kill me, I suppose I should," she said miserably.

* * *

She conditioned herself for a couple more days before she joined Hans in the stables.

He was with his horse, Sitron.

Elsa still couldn't believe why the magnificent creature was names as such. In their Old Language, _sitron_ is literally translated to "lemon". Sitron was with him on board the ship on the day of their wedding, along with all his other possessions. She could tell that he was pretty attach to him, as Kristoff was with Sven the Reindeer.

Seeing as Hans was somehow adept to the Old Language of Arendelle, she knew he _must _be aware of what he had named his own steed.

Sitron whinnied when he caught sight of her, prompting Hans to turn around and make a necessary bow as a courtesy.

"Surely Her Majesty should be somewhere at this hour?" He asked, eyebrow raised at this sudden interruption.

Elsa doesn't need to read between the lines to know that Hans wanted her to leave. But by Heaven, she's the Queen, and she will see herself out whenever she wished.

"Not really," she said casually, looking at the horse instead of her husband. She tried not to notice the glinting hilt of the sword hanging from his belt. "Sitron, right?"

Hans grunted a response, stepping aside as Elsa pats the horse on the nose, to which Sitron snorts appreciatively.

To ward off the incoming silence, Elsa added offhandedly, "I've only ridden a horse once…"

_Dancing around with pointless rhetorics is not going to solve anything_, Elsa thought admonishingly, _But Heaven forbid that I can't start a simple conversation with this man…_

Hans perked up at the comment. "Is that so?"

She could hear the derisive amusement in his voice. But with cheeks aflame, she still nodded.

_First the inability to swim, and now the horsemanship failure. What a laughing stock to my own husband…_

The said incident was when she had accidentally struck Anna while they were playing as children. The King and Queen of Arendelle rushed to the Trolls at the dead of the night without escorts or bodyguards. At the pace they had been going, Elsa nearly slipped off the horse she was sharing with her Father.

Sitron nuzzled his nose against her face, pulling her from her thoughts. She can't help but smile at the affection she was being given.

Hans shifted his weight from foot to foot. The delay was beginning to agitate him. It was then Elsa realised that she has a way to keep him at bay.

"May I ride him?"

"I… Pardon, Your Majesty?" Hans sputtered.

He can't really complain when Elsa began to mount his horse. And Elsa wouldn't have allowed him to object, if he ever did. She clumsily fumbled to get on the horse, awkwardly sitting side-saddled, as her burdensome gown could only allow such position.

Muttering something incoherent, Hans took hold of the reins and guided Sitron out into the palace's spacious back garden.

It was a clear day, barely even ten in the morning. The lush garden seemingly glowed emerald in their eyes. The gentle wind brushed their hair and the tops of the young trees surrounding the area.

Such peaceful scene was not fitting for tension, but that was what both Hans and Elsa were feeling as they silently basked in the morning sun.

"So, you named him Sitron," Elsa started, absently patting the horse on the neck. She noticed that this was always the case whenever they conversed; she was always the one who prompts them.

"Yes, I think we've established that."

"… You do know what that meant in Old Arendellian Language, yes?"

To her surprise, she saw Hans smile as he continued to walk next to her on the ground. "Does Her Majesty not recognise that Sitron is a Fjord horse? He's a native of Arendelle, Your Grace."

Elsa felt her cheeks tingling. "I'm not familiar with horse breeds, I'm afraid…"

Hans simply shrugged. "Anyway, as to your question, I _do _know what the name meant. I gave it to him," he said, "He was an odd pony back then. He never stopped crying. It was driving the staff mad. They wanted to kill him to put an end to his misery."

Elsa cringed inwardly, but she didn't interrupt him.

"There was a lemon tree just beyond the stable fence. Simply put, this odd little baby would stop crying whenever I gave him lemons," Hans said fondly, playfully patting Sitron on the nose. The horse snorted and nudged him on the arm, neighing. "That's where he got his name. I was learning my languages around that time, and I thought the Old Arendellian Language's counterpart of 'lemons' was simply beautiful."

Elsa smiled softly. She hasn't seen this gentle side of Hans before, and it was a nice change from all the brooding he had been doing. "I take you spent so much time in the stables back then?"

Hans' face suddenly shifted. "I was hiding there often," he said quietly in a voice that was simply oozing with contempt. He didn't mean to say it out loud, it seems, as he suddenly cleared his throat and attempted to straighten his posture.

Elsa didn't know what to make of it. The slip intrigued her, surely, but she also felt something else.

_She pities him_.

It reminded her how much she doesn't know about her husband's life prior to this arrangement.

He was stuck in his sullen mood again. Sitron even neighed once or twice, nudging his arm. He would respond by despondently tapping his nose.

As Elsa felt particularly responsible for bringing it up, she said quietly, "Thank you. For letting me ride Sitron, I mean. He's… He's a beautiful horse…"

Hans was quiet for a moment. Elsa was afraid that she had somehow offended him further, and then he turned to look up at her and said, "If Her Majesty would be interested, perhaps I could teach you how to ride horses properly."

Elsa was taken aback by this sudden proposal. It even slipped her mind that she was supposed to ask him about his sword, but she found that she simply couldn't. Surely, the reason behind it doesn't concern her; not when those green eyes looked calmly, _intently_, and innocently at her own.

_There's no reason for him to kill me, surely? Heaven, he doesn't even ask about the fiasco on room separation. And he doesn't know. He'll _never _know of my powers…_

She supposed that she wasn't replying for a long time, as he added, "To ride Sitron, I mean, in case you have spare time. He could get lonely without his friends back at home."

_Of course_, Elsa thought, _For him, Southern Isles was... _is _his home..._

Still, Elsa smiled softly at him. "I would love that."

* * *

"So what was with the sword?"

"… I'm sorry, Anna, what?"

"His sword. Why was he wearing it?"

"Oh…"

"Well, well, well, someone had a good time riding in the back garden this morning, it seems."

"No, I did _not_, Anna."

"Then what's with the book about horsemanship you're holding for?"

"I… You… Didn't you say you have to meet Kristoff later? Oh, stop smiling like that."

"Sure, Elsa. Sure…"

* * *

**~ Notes ~**

**Sitron**: The name of Hans' horse, as seen in the movie, was confirmed by _Frozen _writer, Jennifer Lee, on a tweet, I think. Though the name isn't mentioned throughout the whole film, it was acknowledged as his canonical name.

**A/N: **If there is a slip up in the dialogues, I'll have to apologise. I'm listening to a live police radio scanner while I'm finishing this (and for no reason at all, too. apparently, im insane).


	7. VII - Knowing

to **An Unknown Foreign Beauty**: I guess this one isn't too speedy :/ Sorry. College stuff hapened. || to **Shadowfax321**: You're right. "Just in case".

* * *

**VII****.**

**Knowing**

* * *

Elsa didn't know how things went spiralling from pleasant to absolute ruin.

They spent three whole months living in practiced, mutual respect and idle daily routines before the dam finally breaks.

It was winter, and everyone was expected remain inside their homes and prepare for the worst. It was a tough season, and supplies are hard to get by. Even trade with neighbouring countries became a challenge, as everything seemed to double its worth during times of scarcity.

_Plus there's his barracks to fund_, Elsa often thought irritatedly. She cannot deny, though, that trade and relations with Southern Isles became easier, and Arendellian Merchants managed to have business establishments and houses there as well. Not to mention the discounts that were just too good to be true.

But all of those relations, whatever it may be, needed her approval first, regardless if her Consort was born in that country.

Hans seemed to have forgotten that.

"What's this letter I received that Arendelle's sending two ships of merchandise to the Southern Isles?" Elsa rounded on him one chilly evening in his office.

Barely looking up from blueprints of the barracks, Hans replied monotonously, "You've been rejecting this plea far too many times and as such, they were forwarded to me."

Elsa felt anger beginning to clamour in her chest. "Arendelle is short on supplies itself. In this season, the farms are having difficulties in producing crops. We're saving supplies to last for the winter, _and you're just giving them away_?"

"I'm not giving anything away," Hans replied, unaffected by the Queen's mounting anger, "I've checked the report on supplies before agreeing to the plea. The rations in the market will last long enough if your people are frugal—"

"I made you handle diplomacy at your request since _you _said so yourself that you know little about trading."

Hans finally looked up. "It was a letter from _my_ country, and as such—"

"It needs _my _approval first…"

Hans glowered. "Don't I have the right to make decisions as you do? You've been letting me do half of your paperwork for three _damn_ months."

Elsa returned the glare. She had never expressed anger on him before, and so does he. He _never _cared to question her authority. Throwing caution in the wind, she couldn't care less if her gloves can't handle her powers.

What she says next rendered both of them silent for a good long five seconds.

"You are my husband here, and that is _all_."

Hans looked as though he had been struck in the face. He might've have if Elsa hadn't meticulously honed control all her life.

After a moment or two, Hans blinked, and then scowled further. "I am _aware_, Your Majesty."

Elsa knew she should've just stopped, considering her husband has already admitted defeat. But then she said scornfully, "Really? You seemed to have slipped that from your mind when you acted without my consent."

"I am not a _servant_ here, Your Grace," Hans spat bitterly, rising to his feet, "And as such, I have the right to make my own decisions for _this _country or _mine_!"

Elsa snapped.

"I will _not _have my role usurped!" She practically shouted, clenching her fists when she felt her magic pulsating frantically against to her fingers.

Hans looked taken aback by this outburst, as Elsa had never acted like this to anyone before in a living memory. He would have objected, but Elsa was quick to follow her angry preamble.

"_I _wear the crown. And if there are any faults or deficiencies, they will be of _my _own doing, and no one else will make them! No one, not even _you_."

They were both glaring daggers at one another; daring, challenging, unyielding.

Of course, Hans was the first to yield, even though he was itching to draw his sword and swing it clean into the air aimed at the Queen's throat. He _should_ yield. She was right. He was only a "mere husband" in this Kingdom. And he could not deny that he was getting anxious at the way she was clenching her hands; he was sure that she was visibly restraining herself from unleashing her horrendous magic.

He inhaled sharply and straightened himself. For good measure, he placed his hands behind his back so that he wouldn't be tempted to draw his sword. "I am leaving to give you some time to breathe and compose yourself, Your Grace," he said dismissively, giving what he hoped what a courteous bow before making his way out of the door.

Elsa's face immediately eased into slight shock at his abrupt dismissal of the subject, like a candle extinguished after an unexpected gust of wind. She had expected him to apologise, at least. Not cast the whole thing aside.

"And I'm sure this little disagreement didn't make Her Majesty forget about our meeting with my brother for dinner tonight," Hans said nonchalantly, hand already at the doorknob, not even looking at her.

_Little disagreement?_

Elsa couldn't believe how lightly he was taking this. "You may _not_ go," she sputtered. He can't leave just yet. She has a compulsion to scold him, to lash at him for being so brash and defiant. But for the life of her, he was simply too frigid, too unfeeling. It was impossible to threaten this man. In fact, _she _felt threatened; he was armed with a sword while she… well, she has to keep her only weapon a secret even it will kill her. "I am your Queen, and I'm telling you to stay."

Hans paused for a whole, one foot already out of the room. Elsa was certain that he'll retreat back to the room, as he'd _never _defied an order from her before. But without so much as turning his head, he said, "I'll see Her Highness in half an hour." And then he practically slammed the door behind him.

Elsa could have screamed in frustration. Probably, that was the better thing she could have done to release all the brimming rage threatening to consume her lungs.

She tore off her gloves in anger and stared at the glinting white gold ring on her finger.

It was frozen with ice.

She threw the windows of Hans' office open, letting in a strong gust of numbing winter air. But she doesn't feel it. All she felt was intense anger, suffocation, helplessness, and other words she can't completely describe.

She might have fractured her finger after she had wrenched the ring off her hand.

She wanted to throw it away into the dark unknown beyond Hans' window. It was a mark of her irrevocable bond to a doomed marriage. Her arm was already poised to catapult the damned thing out of her life. As if anyone could tell that she wasn't wearing it. She was always wearing her gloves. And so does Hans. She was almost sure he doesn't wear _his_.

But in the end, she closed the window and resorted to slam her fists on the table. Burning tears of frustration prickled her eyes and she furiously blinked them away.

No. She shouldn't be stupid about this.

She's a Queen, for Heaven's sake. She's expected to be the last to lose her head. A moment of anger should not tear her apart. Tossing the ring won't give her the sense of freedom she longs for.

Nothing ever will.

And if she wanted to get rid of him, she could have just freeze his heart and be done with it.

It will be easier— _so much easier— _than freezing a damn ring.

* * *

She was sure that thirty minutes of not seeing him will make the rest of the evening better.

That was when she realised that she had forgotten to wear her gloves.

She might have bolted back to her room if Hans hadn't entered the private dining room, which has been specially prepared for the King of the Southern Isles.

Her irritation sprang up, joining the mounting panic that was already building up within her. She'd never faced a noble dignitary before without the protection of her gloves. Heaven knows that she even wears them even though she was entirely alone out of habit, and the she simply felt exposed and oh so vulnerable without them.

She still wanted to make a run for them when Hans spoke up. "_Please_ don't let whatever unpleasantries we've had to show in dinner," he said, taking his usual seat to her left after propping his sword against the table.

She would have waved off the comment, but she was still in the heat of her anger at his disrespectful leave earlier that she simply couldn't bite her tongue. "Why? Afraid of your brother finding out how you've been behaving?" she said coolly, answering his gaze and silently challenging him to repeat the same crass behaviour he had displayed earlier.

"Oh for Heaven's sake. Do you _really _want him to find out about that little thing?"

"Oh, if it's _little_, then I guess we shouldn't be having problems here."

"Just because you're the Queen—"

"Oh I dare you to finish that sentence."

Hans' murderous glare made it clear that he might have if Kai hadn't announced that the King of the Southern Isles is just beyond the door.

The Royal Couple barely had time to regain composure as Osvald stepped into the parlour.

Hans thought he looked older. Given, Osvald is a couple of decades ahead of him, but he looked like he'd aged twenty years more. Angry streaks of grey and white hair mixed with dark brown. His eyes, which Hans had always remembered to be exact copies of their father's, seemed to be bathed in a darker shade. When he smiled, it didn't reach his eyes. To Hans, it looked strained, forced. In fact, it seems as though he hadn't smiled in a while.

He looked tired. Sick, even. But he assured them that he was fine when Elsa asked him abut his health.

The first part of their meeting rolled on smoothly as Elsa and Osvald exchanged political views. it was the first time they've met in person after all. Hans sat quietly as he ate, glancing at Osvald every now and then, studying him, observing him, as if he was seeing his brother for the first time.

He even noticed as they ate that his wife's hands were completely devoid of gloves tonight. He wondered if it was stupidity or bravery that prompted her to go publicly without them, but in the wake of their argument, he nonchalantly dismissed the thought of her losing control of her powers. Osvald knew, of course, so there was no point should she ever slip.

And then Osvald suddenly brought up, "You've been married to my brother for some time now, Your Majesty. Tell me, are you still without child?"

Hans nearly spat out the wine he had been sipping and Elsa's fork suddenly clattered noisily on her plate after she had dropped it.

Elsa cleared her throat and sat up straight. "Well…" she managed to say after a pause. It was clear that her husband was not going to speak, so she did it for him. She answered in a small voice, "Not quite yet."

"Really?" Osvald drawled, turning to look at his younger brother, "Forgive me, but I find that impossible to believe."

Hans shot a warning glare at his brother. _Don't you dare…_

"… And why is that, Your Highness?" Elsa asked hesitantly, lowering her bare hands on her lap to hide them from plain sight, sensing the shift in the mood.

"Why Hans, I do believe you've been frugal in sharing your _exploits _to the Queen," Osvald said.

Hans stared incredulously at Osvald. _Why is you doing this? You arranged this marriage and you've the mind to suddenly start tearing it apart_.

That wasn't the last of it, it seems.

The whole affair suddenly took a deadly turn.

Osvald rounded on the speechless Queen, and began pointing out the flaws he saw in her kingdom.

_Brutally_, Hans noted.

Right then and there, he barked that he saw Arendelle as a weak nation; defenceless and carelessly unguarded. He also began to question how she handled diplomacies, since it was clear in the reports he had been asking Hans to send to him that she still limits her contact with any other country except with Southern Isles. As if that wasn't enough, he also tackled how she should run the economy, and began to suggest pointing an adviser to aid her "obviously suffering reign".

"_Osvald_," Hans intervened in a low tone. He could see the drastic changes in Elsa's demeanour, and he wasn't liking it. She stared at the table blankly, and all the colour had drained from her cheeks. Not to mention the room had suddenly felt colder; she's losing her grip on her control as she's losing her confidence.

For a brief moment, he didn't see a dumbstruck Queen. Instead, he saw in her place a pale little redheaded boy, face completely devoid of emotion as laughter— vicious, teasing, and brutal laughter— rang out from all around the table. He hid behind a glass of indifference. Should he crack a tear or acknowledge their horrible jests, the glass would shatter—

"It's the truth," Osvald grunted, leaning back and crossing arms. "I don't see how this country had held on for so long—"

"The Queen is doing _fine_, Osvald," Hans growled, reaching under the table in search of the Queen's hands, suddenly finding the need to defend her.

He finds her hand a heartbeat later. His heart plummeted when he realised how cold it was. He was wearing his gloves, yet it literally felt like he was touching ice with bare hands. Her hand was violently shaking. She clawed at the fabric on her lap to keep herself in check. Her rigid form slackened a little, however, when she felt Hans cover her entire hand with his.

Warmth enveloped her left hand all of the sudden. All the heat seemed to have surged back to that one particular portion of her body. She might as well could have been wearing a glove in that hand alone. Elsa glanced up, and she saw that he was looking at her. Their argument seemed like ages ago now. In fact, with a single look from him, it felt like it never happened.

_He's here. He's on my side…_

"That barely describes how I see things are being done around here," Osvald continued, now addressing to his brother, "Perhaps it would be better if you would entrust this country to _my _jurisdiction. You'll see how lacklustre her current reign is when I'm done making changes here."

Hans would have rebutted, but he suddenly jumped on his seat when Elsa abruptly wrenched her hand from his grip and stood to her feet.

"I need a moment," she said, sounding so distant. And she was out in the Palace Gardens in several strides. The temperature seemed to have grown warmer after she left.

Hans turned angrily to his brother. "_What is wrong with you_?" he snarled. "I've never seen you behave like this before—"

"Are you planning to impregnate the Queen?" Osvald said nonchalantly, returning to his dinner.

"I… _What_?" Hans blurted incredulously, "That's all you can say after—?"

"If you're too _cowardly _to ask for the title of 'King' instead of a petty 'Consort', then perhaps your son could inherit the title for you," Osvald continued as if they were conversing about the weather, "By default, the heir of the throne would still be of Southern Isle bloodline. I could wait that long. I'm not that old."

It doesn't take Hans long enough to put the pieces to together.

_He wants me to hold my wife by the neck by being king. _

If he became king, Elsa's right as a queen will be rendered near powerless if he willed it to be the case. Following that trail of thought, it came to him.

_And with me as King, _he'll_ be the one who's going to hold _me_ by the neck._ _Valentin was right_. _He's obsessed. Completely mad in expanding his reign, his territory…_

"Look… It's been a long day," Hans said quietly.

This was not the time to argue about this. Not when Elsa is out there in the gardens. And with their "little disagreement" earlier, guessed as much that she won't be happy should he make a statement to his brother right now.

So he continued, "And thanks to you, the Queen just lost her appetite. So… Could you do the world a favour and return to the guest room to prepare for your departure tomorrow morning? We can talk more about this in your next visit."

Osvald shrugged again, rising to his feet after a lengthy swig from the wine bottle laid out on the table. "This is why women should never sit on the damn throne. Too sentimental, too emotional for my taste. And to make things worse, this woman is a freak with ice powers. Tell her to consider my offer. It might do Arendelle a favour. Oh, and Hans? Send my compliments to the chef."

* * *

It doesn't take him long to find her.

The snowfall was thick. He was shuddering uncontrollably as he marched on, still on his dinner clothes; hardly equipped for the weather.

The most obvious place to shelter oneself in this downpour is in the gazebo. There was a lamp post somewhere, but in this thick torrent, its light barely made it through the curtains of snow falling from the sky. The golden glow casted a misty, waning light over the gazebo, but it was enough for him to spot Elsa's silhouette under its roof.

There was a snowman just beyond the gazebo. Elsa obviously made it herself with her powers; he could hardly imagine the Queen crouching by the snow to manually build a snowman with her own hands. She was quiet as he ducked under the gazebo's cover, shrugging the snow off his body and madly rubbing his arms to return some heat.

Her back was turned from the light, and he could barely see her face in the dark. There was no way he could read her emotions now.

When it was clear that she was not going to say anything, he pulled off his two gloves. They were oversized for her tiny, slender hands, but he figured that they might help to appease her at the moment. All her life, he realised, the gloves must have been more or less part of her anatomy.

"Here," he said, his breath coming out in a fog.

He heard her sigh. "I _don't_ need them," she said quietly.

He knew, of course, but he needed her to be calmed first before he talks to her. "It's cold out—"

This time, she huffed impatiently. "I _don't feel _the cold, all right?" she suddenly spat out, making Hans retreat a step away from her. She was angry all right, but this isn't like the anger he had witnessed earlier in his office. No. This was an anger of a person who was breaking slowly, "I _never _do!"

He could have said many things to brush off the obvious slip of the tongue. He might have continued to feign his ignorance, his indifference. He might have continued to abhor her for being condemned in an empty marriage, in an endless servitude.

But he pities her.

Heaven, he does.

This isn't her fault.

The marriage was not her doing. Being born with accursed powers was not a fate she might have chosen for herself.

It was his turn to sigh and turn away from her. He held the railings of the gazebo, bare hands and all, oblivious to the biting cold as he breathed out in a voice that was barely above a whisper, "I know."

It seemed like an eternity have passed before Elsa spoke in a small voice, "What?"

"I know," Hans repeated, still not facing her. "I've always known."

A pause.

He expected her to ask why he hadn't divulged the information sooner. But he didn't expect a snowball hitting him squarely on the back of his neck.

"_S__øn af en tæ__ve__!_" he cursed, spinning around, indignant.

He didn't expect a cold palm hitting him on the face either. It was twice as painful as it should have been, seeing as the cold only made his skin more sensitive.

"Do you have _any _idea _at all_ on how _terrified _I was to death trying to hide this from you?" She practically shouted. She was livid. She's never been so enraged her entire life. Even Osvald's barbaric behaviour seemed to be trivial all of the sudden.

"Maybe."

_Slap!_

"All right," he muttered, rubbing the sore half of his face now, "_Fine_. Sorry."

She looked as though she was dying to hit him again with the way her arm was poised to aim another strike at his face. But she merely huffs to expel the heavy breath she had been heaving in her chest. Elsa retreated to her end of the gazebo, propping her hip against the railing. "Figures," she muttered, "Are all men from Southern Isles this… _bad_?"

"Admit it, you were dying to say 'evil' back there."

"So you admit it yourself?" she muttered skeptically.

As much as he was enjoying this little banter of theirs, he couldn't deny it.

Osvald had turned to an entirely different man. His brothers… Well, all of them were devil-spawned except for Valentin. And as for him… He admit that he won't be getting a "Good Husband" award anytime soon. He had played her, tricked her, ignoredher, _fought _with her— generally, he had been no different from his own brothers. He guessed it was an acquired skill, coming from a family like that…

He was sure, in the way the light fell on him, that Elsa could see his face clearly. He wondered if she questioned the small, defeated smile he was giving her right now.

"Yes. We are," he said, "There was no way you could have known that you were being married to a monster at a first glance."

_Great. As if I can sink lower by degrading myself further…_

"_You_ knew youwere being married to a monster," Elsa suddenly said. She was still angry, he could tell, but it toned down considerably. He was no stranger to self-pity, and he could detect it easily within that statement. "You agreed anyway."

Hans chuckled miserably. "Oh my Queen, as if we had a choice. And besides," he said, standing straight, "You haven't killed me so far, and you don't look anywhere near the ugly monsters in the books. You're far too beautiful for that."

If this old trick of flattery worked on her, he couldn't have guessed; he still couldn't see her face. But it sounds like she didn't give in just yet when she said, "You could have continued to pretend not to know. And you might've, I'm sure," she continued, voice stern, crossing her arms, "Why didn't you, then? Are you finally exhausted in tricking me?"

It was clear that she wasn't going to forgive him anytime soon. He accepts that. To her, it was like building a wall for many years only to discover that it had a huge gaping hole all along. He wouldn't have cared, normally. He could have continued to live a life of silence and apathy with an estranged wife.

But thanks to Osvald, he suddenly felt compelled to stop being an arsehole for her.

Elsa looked incredibly shattered under Osvald's hostility. Hans could've guessed as much from a girl who was raised in an environment entirely different from his. Sure, she was orphaned, but she only had one sister to deal with, and that sister happens to be one of her reasons to live for everyday. Not unlike his own house; a breeding ground for soldiers in an endless war against one another.

There doesn't need to be a war between him and his wife. He realised that, in a battle, one has to admit defeat before both sides destroy one another.

In this case, he was supposed to be the one to surrender.

He raised his hand.

In the lamp's distant light, his wedding ring glinted on his finger.

He heard Elsa chuckle softly as she gently shook her head, bringing her hands together. "So you're still wearing that…"

"Now that everything's out of the open, I figured, you know… Maybe— just maybe— we could still make this work? You know, we could _try_, Elsa."

Elsa fiddled with her hands. Hans saw that she was fidgeting with her own wedding ring. He somehow felt grateful and slightly surprised that she was wearing hers. He was certain that she must have thrown it into oblivion after their argument in his office.

She looked up. "You've never…"

"I've never what?"

"Never called me by name before…"

"Oh. Yes, well, I always thought addressing you as 'Your Majesty' or 'Your Highness' is more appropriate—"

"For a husband to call his own wife?"

"For a prince to refer to his Queen."

"Wow. So much for trying."

"I'm trying right now. You're just making this difficult."

"Aren't you cold?'

"You're— What?"

She approached him. The war between them was finally over when Elsa took his gloves from his grasp and refitted them into his hands. She looked at him up and down, and then shook her head as she gave his glove one final tug. "You're an idiot, walking in this weather in _that_."

"To find _you_."

In this proximity, he was sure he saw her roll her eyes. "As if I'm going anywhere…"

"I told you, I'm _trying_."

She doesn't trust him just yet, he can feel it. And she won't be trusting him sooner; not after this I-knew-all-along-but-pretended-I-didn't debacle. It was like thawing ice in winter; pointless and exhausting.

But she didn't argue when he resorted to escort her back inside, offering his arm like the gentleman he was supposed to be. He escorted her all the way to her room with neither of them passing a word to one another, but she didn't let go of his arm. And she felt stronger with the sight of his missing sword and the fact that since they both knew about her powers, he shouldn't be trying anything funny around her.

"You're… _brother_ will be gone when I wake up?" she asked, still defensive, still guarded, but otherwise civil with him now as they stood by her door.

"Of course. I'll be escorting him to the docks by the break of dawn," Hans replied.

"Good."

A pause.

And then Hans said, "Do you have Gustav Lensherr's _Fem Stadier_?"

She raised an eyebrow in question. "Yes, why?"

"Read the last line of chapter four," he said. She was about to question him more about this when he suddenly bowed and added, "God natt, min Dronning."

Without looking at her again, he spun on his heel and headed to the next corridor.

* * *

Elsa read the words over and over again, until she fell asleep, with the book still open next to her.

Hans had picked her door open in ungodly hours before dawn. She might kill him for it… If he gets caught, that is.

But he didn't linger anyway.

He left her gloves on top of the pages of the open book; the gloves she had left in his office.

And then he leaves, but not before glancing at the last lines of the page he had told her to read earlier.

_Your hand on your heart chills your soul. Your heart in my hands expels the cold._

* * *

**NOTES ~**

**_S__øn af en_ _tæve_**:This fic was rated "T" for a reason, but yeah, I digress in translating this.

**Gustav Lensherr: **Is a fictional character; a random offscreen OC. _Fem Stadier_, more or less, is also a fictional novel. In Norwegian, it means, "Five Stages".

**Your hand on your heart [...] expels the cold: **It's a line from _Eternally Us_, a game developed by the Adventure Game Studio. It alludes to the five stages of death (Hence why I thought of _Fem Stadier_). This line is found on the fourth level, "Depression".

* * *

**A/N: **They're still on a sour note against each other, but hey, I'm trying to make their forced relationship as realistic as possible. But we're getting there.


	8. VIII - Midwinter

**A/N: **There is no plausible and forgivable reason for this incredibly late update. So I've compensated, raised my limit for a bit, and made it longer than any other chapter so far.

* * *

**VIII****.**

**Midwinter**

* * *

His day had kicked off on a sour note when he escorted Osvald to the docks.

Osvald barely said goodbye to him as he walked up the gangplank, but he parted with Hans in anger at the last minute.

On the carriage ride to the docks, Osvald had insisted to send fleets of his own to Hans' barracks in Arendelle. Hans severely responded that he will not tolerate military units that do not bend to his command, and Osvald did not appreciate this resistance from his own brother.

The cold, white morning did little to quell his burning anger, but once he stepped off the carriage in the palace courtyard, Hans was knocked dumbstruck when he found the castle in a state of chaos.

The staff kept screaming about an "animated snowman" loose somewhere in the castle as they ran about, calling for the guards. Hans was directed to the Arendelle Palace Gardens by a sane sweeper, and he found the Queen, her sister, and a frightened assembly of chambermaids and guards reluctantly hanging about.

He easily saw the eye of the chaotic storm.

It was a child-sized snowman jumping excitedly on the spot as he— Hans assumed _it _was a _he_ in the way the snowman spoke— conversed with the Queen.

Of course, for someone who had a fair share of normalcy for most of his life, Hans' first reaction was to simply stand there, rendered useless and unsure of what to do at the sight of the obvious anomaly taking place right in front of him. It was abnormal; _witchcraft_, one might say.

He felt a strange sense of unease and slight horror as the little snowman suddenly turned to look at him. His agitation bubbled when the snowman began hopping towards him.

"Hi, I'm Olaf—!"

"_What the hell is that thing_?" Hans hollered as he instinctively drew his sword and held it defensively in front of him.

"Wait!" This time, it was Elsa who intervened, hurriedly stepping in between the two. She addressed to him as she said, "Calm down. He's harmless."

"_Harmless_?" Hans spat derisively, "Look at it!"

The snowman— _Olaf_, as it called itself— waved his arms uselessly, and then looked up at Elsa, saying, "He's right, you know. Someone could lose an eye with _these _pointy twigs. Maybe you could give me one of your gloves!"

Hans pointedly ignored him and addressed to Elsa, "Where did he even come from?"

He realised a split second later this was probably the same snowman that Elsa had meticulously built near the entrance of the gazebo last night. He still couldn't put a finger on it how Elsa managed to bring a lump of shaped snow into life. A _sentient_ one too.

And he cant't imagine the facade he had to put up if he hadn't confessed that he had known all along that he was married to a woman with freak ice powers.

After the hype died down, Elsa managed to convince everyone to return to their duties, and everyone went about to continue their daily routine as normal as they could.

Feeling the need to return the normalcy in the castle, Elsa led the Royal Family to the dining hall for breakfast, with Olaf bouncing by her side.

"So… How long have you known?" Anna began, hands at her back as she walked alongside Hans.

"Known what?" Hans muttered, his hand still on the handle of his sheathed sword as he glanced at the skipping snowman ahead.

"I think you know exactly what I'm talking about," Anna said, "You're not questioning why Olaf's with us this morning."

She was talking about his lack of reaction to the snowman, it seemed.

"I've had my theories beforehand," Hans purported.

"That's not what Elsa told me this morning," Anna replied, frowning slightly.

Hans let out an annoyed sigh. "If you've known all along, then why are you asking me?"

"I'm testing you. And I'm sorry to say that you've failed me," Anna muttered, "And if you'd known about her powers all along, then why do you have to act like you don't?"

"I don't see how this concerns you, _mother_," he growled irritatedly underneath his breath.

He was taken by surprise when Anna bumped— more like _crashed_— her shoulder against his, temporarily knocking him off his feet. He glared at her, and Anna merely stuck out her tongue on him.

"That's just real mature," he muttered to her.

"Says the boy who lied to my sister."

Hans glared at her."Excuse me, I'm obviously older than you. What are you, fifteen?"

Anna huffed indignantly. "Try eighteen."

"Wouldn't have known the difference, little girl. Because you certainly don't act like your age."

Elsa and Olaf had to stop several seconds later when they heard a scuffle behind them. And Elsa was scandalised— and amused— when she saw Anna trying with all her might to pull off Hans' sideburns.

* * *

After the incident at the gazebo nearly two weeks ago, Hans seemed to have reverted to his taciturn, broody self.

And it seemed to have taken a turn for the worse.

He has found numerous excuses to miss meals with the Queen more often. At breakfast, he feigned having urgent matters at his barracks, and would extend his stay there all the way until lunch hours had passed. At evenings, he wold claim that he is exhausted, and would turn in early, which would more often than not result to severe hunger.

In any event that he couldn't find a plausible excuse to leave the Queen's presence, he was adamant in keeping his silence.

Not even Olaf could cajole him out of his surly attitude.

"No, she could perfectly ride a horse on her own, thank you very much," Hans replied tersely, striding as quickly as he could away from the snowman. "I've seen her do it. I don't see why I should go there to _assist _her."

Olaf had to jump several paces to keep up with him. "She said she was hoping to ride your horse, Snicket—"

"_Sitron_."

"That's what I meant."

"Tell her she can take him out for a ride. I'm busy with something else anyway," Hans muttered irritatedly, hastily turning to another corridor, away from the stables. He _was _planning to take Sitron to the docks today, but apparently, the Queen made this impossible to happen.

Olaf followed him. "She was kind of wondering why you're avoiding her, though," he said, bouncing by his side. "Oops… She told me not to say that." He chuckled, as if it had been a delightful mistake to commit.

Hans didn't say anything.

He _had _been avoiding her, there was no pretense in that.

If anything, it was pride.

It was enough, he supposed, that he had shown an incredible moment of vulnerability and weakness before the Queen. He wasn't supposed to care, that was the plan. It was going to make his life bearable in this forced marriage, and since it was made clear that he was no more than a "mere husband" to her with no power over the kingdom, he might as well remain incognito for the rest of his life.

But Osvald's aggressive treatment to the Elsa had triggered something; something that he had buried deep inside his chest long ago and swore never to relive ever again. When he saw her eyes that night at the dinner with Osvald, for a moment, a powerful yet melancholic memory sprang up. For a moment, flashes of a horrible childhood came back with burning fervour, dancing right in front of his eyes.

And he melted.

The need to protect Elsa from such an experience became so overwhelming, so consuming. He would do as his father and Valentin would. He was going to stand by her side; the pretense _had_ to come to an end…

But now that the moment had passed, his defences solidified again.

He unceremoniously shoved his pity into a corner. Months of loathing his wife to the point that he contemplated to kill her in his dreams persisted, and the change of having Elsa readily engage him in conversations seemed like an unpleasant malfunction he can never get used to.

_A moment of madness_, he used to convince himself as he lie awake at night. _I don't need her. She certainly doesn't need me. _

"So… I'll tell her that you're busy, then?" Olaf asked.

"Tell her not to disturb me for such a trivial thing ever again," he said with a tone of finality.

* * *

He was sick.

One moment, his feet were safely planted on the docks as he oversaw the construction of his barracks. A second later, a blur of white flashed at the corner of his eye, and not a moment too soon, he plummeted into the icy sea as snow continued to fall overhead.

Now he found himself paralysed in bed, shuddering violently and uncontrollably even though he was safe in his stronghold of blankets.

It was Anna's fault, of course.

She and the Queen had arrived uninvited to the docks that day, and throwing a snowball was her way of saying hello and getting his attention.

She didn't expect him to fall sideways off the platform, though.

She visited him several times, often unaccompanied by her sister, to profusely apologise. Even though she was very sincere in expressing her regret over the matter, Hans had been in an incredibly foul mood for the duration of his confinement. He often drove her away with horrible remarks, but to his chagrin, she kept returning.

Anna allotted hours everyday to stay by his side, soldiering on to make him laugh, smile, or feel better, in general.

At first, he was resistant to this intrusion into his heavily protected self. He suppressed overwhelming urges to react. He stopped himself when she prompted conversations with tempting questions. He refused— with all his might— to acknowledge the girl who had— unintentionally— thrown him in harm's way.

His sweltering fever went and returned, like a vagrant rogue returning on rote to a lover.

Delusions plagued his dreams. He shook tremulously and said things in his sleep. He was hungry and he felt full all the time at the same time. There were even hours where moving an inch would be agonising.

Though it all, Anna returned to him, consoled him.

On the fourth morning of his affliction, he woke up to find Anna passed out on the couch in his room, with the book she had been reading to him the night before placed precariously on her face.

He could faintly hear her snoring, and in that moment, Hans wondered if he had died.

Surely, no one could be this nice to him.

* * *

"Elsa's birthday is coming up, you know," Anna said one week later, handing him a cup of strong tea she made herself.

"Good morning to you, too," Hans muttered, lips pressed tightly as he gulped down the nauseating brew. He would endure the taste if it credits her effort. "And this interests me because…?"

Anna made a face. "Um, she's your _wife_…?"

Hans grimaced. _I barely know her. I don't know what she likes_, was the truth. He tells her, "I don't know what to give her," which was half the truth.

"Hm. That's why I'm here," Anna said, "She's fairly easy to impress—"

"Maybe she was just being polite, regardless of what you give her, no matter how horrible it may be," Hans muttered to the tea.

He and Anna had reached a point beyond formalities, and he could be rude to her knowing that she will never take him seriously; one of Anna's many faults and one of the many things to love about her.

Anna scoffed. "I think a simple dinner and a _sane _conversation will suffice," she said, absently pacing around the room, "She's been worried sick about you these last few days—"

"She has a funny way of showing it," Hans snorted derisively, noting the lack of visit from the Queen herself.

He'd only seen a glimpse of her once in is confinement. Even now, he wondered if it was a memory or another vivid dream. He was delirious with fever one afternoon, and he thought he saw Elsa standing by the door. He could hardly see with a hazy eyesight, and he could barely recognise her face, but he'd recognise that brilliant blonde mane anywhere. He blacked out on that moment, and when he came to, night had come, and he was alone.

Anna rolled her eyes. "Yeah, because she thinks you might get worse if she visits you a lot—"

"Probably, seeing as we'll just bore each other by doing nothing productive—"

"No, Hans," Anna said with a hint of impatience, "She's _scared_."

He set the teacup to his lap to lean back and look at her fully. "… Scared how?"

"She's worried," Anna explained, "And when Elsa's worked up… Well, you know how her power gets. According to the doctor, you're skin's a bit more sensitive in your state. She literally thinks she's too cold to be so close to you."

Hans resisted to roll his eyes. "It's just fever. There's nothing to get worked up about."

Anna fidgeted with the hem of her sleeve, suddenly looking distressed. "You were talking in your sleep, and you weren't exactly being quiet when you have your… fits. Your skin was burning, you were shaking rather uncontrollably, and everyone thought… _she _thought… well…"

"… Was it really that bad?" If he had been near dying, he hardly felt it. There was just a dull ache all over his body, keeping him sluggish and lazy, and he _did_ develop a slight sensitivity to cold, but that was mostly the aftershocks of his bout with death.

"Probably, since Elsa kept asking me to check on you every hour or so—" Anna paled slightly, stopping in the middle of the room, "… Don't tell her I told you that, I wasn't supposed to, oh no…"

"Oh…? It's fine, it's fine… I won't…" He wasn't exactly sure what he was agreeing to at the moment, as he was very preoccupied in processing what he'd just heard.

It didn't even occur to him that Anna had been acting on her sister's orders. He assumed that the excessive visits were the princess's way of compensating for nearly killing him. It might have been the case, it might have been not. Knowing Anna, it might have been both. It's easy to read into Anna's personality, since she blatantly wears her heart on her sleeve.

Elsa, on the other hand, guards all that she is behind a wall of repression. Once things get too close for comfort— especially when she's on an unfamiliar ground such as marriage— she tends to recoil. He can blame the reason behind their abysmal marriage on her more than he would credit himself, if he was going to be honest.

She kept pushing him away and yet she kept pulling in. _Bless her soul_, he thought, _She tries_.

It was something that impressed and intimidated him because he knew he'll never be able to give back the same effort as she does.

"… All right," he said, looking up, "What do you think will work for her?"

He'll be damned if he won't push himself to care and try for himself.

* * *

A series of "once" managed to salvaged their marriage.

Once, Elsa personally checked on Hans herself one late night, carrying his dinner on a tray in her arms. They barely talked. She just watched him eat, and he ate silently with his eyes never meeting hers. When he was nearly done, he decided to say something— _anything_— to her. He looked up, only to see her making her way out of the door.

He didn't stop her.

Once, she ran into him while she tried to make her way surreptitiously to the kitchen to ask for something to nibble on while she worked in her study. She met him on the stairs at the back of the castle; a much less frequented route by servants not working in the kitchen. He was a bit surprised to see her out and about on her own in the halls, and he deftly handed her a single slice of cake.

Elsa uncharacteristically stuttered, "No, I mean— You got this for yourself, I can't possibly—"

"I was supposed to give this to you, Your Highness," Hans said nonchalantly, "But thank you nonetheless for saving me the trouble of walking all the way to you. Excuse me." And he promptly brushed past her, not even sparing her a backwards glance as he disappeared.

She didn't stop him.

Once, she appropriated herself into his office to check on his progress, only to find him sleeping with his head in his arms on his desk. It was furiously snowing outside, and the fire in his office had dimmed itself to embers. The room was practically swimming in semi-darkness. Elsa could easily tell that the office was submerged in a relatively low temperature despite being immune to it herself when she saw the telltale fog clouding the windows.

She returned minutes later, cautiously placing a blanket on his shoulders. He didn't twitch a single muscle.

She studied him for a minute before escorting herself out of room. His shoulders barely moved. It was as if he died on the chair. His hair was a stark contrast to his pale complexion. He still looked a bit peaky, but he had been returning to and fro the docks every other day. He seemed to be recovering in a torturously slow pace.

His gloves were off, and she could see that he was wasn't wearing his wedding ring. Instead, he held it, as if in a death grip, with his thumb and index finger…

She turned away. Her hand was already on the doorframe when she heard him.

"Thank you," he said, his voice barely inaudible against the howling winds beyond the windows.

She merely nodded, not looking at him, and she was gone.

Once, he was reading by himself in the great library of the castle, comfortably lounged on a sofa in front of a roaring fireplace, when Elsa entered.

She balked when she saw him, and then she continued on her way to fill her arms with tomes of various weights and sizes. In a span of several minutes, she returned, balancing the aforementioned books precariously as she made her way to where he sat.

"May I join you?" she asked, angling herself so that she could see beyond the small mountain of books in her arms.

Hans looked up, his face vividly pronounced under the firelight. He held her gaze for a moment, glancing at the numerous chairs, divans, and sofas scattered sparsely in the library, before silently nodding. He scooted, giving her more room to sit on.

Hours were spent in utter silence save for the occasional turn of a page and the spitting of the fire. A servant quietly entered and softly announced that it was time for dinner. Hans nodded in acknowledgment, and when he looked across the sofa, he saw that his wife fell asleep.

Quite unladylike, she sat jackknifed into the arm of the sofa, pillowing her head with her hands, facing him. Her face was serene, and her lips were slightly parted. In her calm, he could tell that at the first signs of danger, she would easily sprang into action. He'd never seen anyone so relaxed and tense all at the same time—

He blinked away his thoughts and he turned collectively to the servant, who was still waiting at a respectable distance. "Send our apologies to the cooks and to the Princess Anna. The Queen and I are retiring for the day," he said, beginning to rise and stretch.

The servant left, and soon after, Hans made his way to the bedroom with his wife safely secured in his arms. He thought he felt her stiffen as he gracefully scooped her from the sofa, but as he walked on, she didn't stir again, and Elsa remained immobile in his embrace.

He laid her down on the bed, in her day clothes and all— he could never bring himself to undress her, for the love of Heaven— and see to it to escort himself out of the room at once. His hand was already on the doorknob when—

"Hans," Elsa called, clear and resolute; the intonation of someone who was obviously awake for some time.

He paused, still facing the door. "Your Highness," he returned curtly.

"… Would you mind— I mean, if it's all right with you… Will you…?"

He dropped his hand to his side, waiting.

"Would you mind staying with me for the night?"

He might have cricked his neck for turning his head a little bit too fast. _Surely she wasn't thinking of—? _

Some of his shock might have materialised on his face, because Elsa's immaculately pale face gradually acquired a pinkish hue.

"N-Not in _that_ way, no…" she maundered, staring at her gloved hands, flexing them agitatedly on her lap.

Normally, he would have scoffed off a scathing remark, perhaps even offer to fetch Anna for her, but he smothered the idea as soon as it came. He was tired. Dead tired and sick of being indifferent, of being callous. The incapacity to show affection was beginning to gnaw at him, tearing apart what little humanity he still possessed.

_What the hell_. "Of course."

He deftly pulled off his gloves and stepped out of his boots before sliding underneath the covers, all done without looking at her. The bed was— _thankfully_, he thought—wide, and he hovered on the edge; one more inch and he'll fall onto the carpeted floor…

"… Thank you," she said.

He didn't respond.

There was a gust of cold wind, released and abated all at a wave of Elsa's hand, and all the candles in the room were extinguished.

Silence.

He hadn't been in bed with his wife for so long that he could barely breathe lest she suddenly turn him into an ice sculpture. Gradually, his fatigue won over his anxiety , and he slipped into unconsciousness.

He woke up later, in the early hours of dawn, to find Elsa's hand on top of his own.

Her hand was cold, of course. The tingling and numbing sensation was the one that unpleasantly roused him. But the wedding ring on her finger was colder still against his relatively warm knuckles.

Hans sighed and closed his eyes again, not even bothering to look at her.

_Left foot, right foot. One step at a time, one foot in front of the other. We'll get there. _

_Eventually._

* * *

**A/N: **Just so we're clear, ladies and sirs, I don't have a beta. So if you see any error- in logic, grammar, spelling, _und so weiter_\- kindly bring them to my attention. I greatly appreciate the comments, favorites, and follows, and I will definitely owe it to any person who'll help me grow as a better "writer". Besides, it makes the heart swell to know that readers of this fanfiction are active and interactive with its deranged author.


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